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HAPPY 

CHOOL  DAY; 


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HAPPY   SCHOOL    DAYS 


*  Of.  CALIF.   LIBRARY,   LOb  AMBLES 


Happy  School  Days 


BY 

MARGARET  E.  SANGSTER 

AUTHOR    OF 

"WINSOME  WOMANHOOD,"  ETC. 


CHICAGO 

FORBES  &  COMPANY 
1912 


Copyright,   1909, 
BY  FORBES  AND  COMPANY 


FOREWORD 

TN  this  book  to  girls  I  am  going  to  put 
some  bits  of  practical  advice  for  all  the 
schoolgirls  who  make  beautiful  our  streets 
as  they  hurry  on,  to  be  in  their  places  before 
nine  o'clock  in  the  morning. 

There  are  many  thousands  of  you,  dear 
girls,  who  are  the  pride  and  joy  of  the  homes 
you  come  from.  I  like  to  catch  the  inspira- 
tion of  your  bright  looks,  to  hear  your  sweet 
voices,  and  to  watch  the  lightness  of  your 
feet  as  you  flit  along  over  the  country  roads 
or  village  pavements,  or  the  thronged  ave- 
nues of  our  great  towns. 

You  are  schoolgirls,  and  you  are  told 
every  day  by  grown  people  that  you  are  liv- 
ing your  happiest  days.  There  are  times 
when  you  would  very  gladly  change  places 
with  girls  who  do  not  go  to  school,  if  only  you 
could.  For  school  life  has  its  shadow  as 
well  as  its  sunshine. 


2132522 


FOREWORD 


But  girls,  there  is  so  much  more  sunshine 
than  shadow  that  school  life  should  be  very 
satisfying  to  you.  Books  are  unfolding  for 
you.  You  are  getting  hold  of  new  ideas. 
You  are  learning  the  joy  of  mastery  over 
tough  subjects.  Nothing  is  finer  than  hav- 
ing a  tussle  with  algebra  or  Latin  or  physics, 
and  coming  out  on  the  other  side,  a  con- 
queror. I  am  not  sure  that  any  joy  surpasses 
this.  The  old  concrete  problem,  the  irreg- 
ular verb,  the  secret  that  flies  out  of  your 
sight  like  a  bird,  to  catch  hold  of  them,  to 
keep  them  fast,  to  know  that  they  are  yours 
forever,  to  find  your  mind  obeying  your 
will  —  girls,  this  is  triumph,  this  is  glory,  this 
is  joy. 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.  The  "  Ail-Around  "  Schoolgirl  ...  9 

II.  Pluck,  Perseverance  and  Punctuality  .  15 

III.  The  Unpopular  Schoolgirl  ....  22 

IV.  Perplexing   Studies 29 

V.  The  Lessons  You  Don't  Like  ...  35 

VI.  Mathematics 43 

.VII.  How  to  Write 50 

VIII.  Examinations 57 

IX.  The  Unpopular  Teacher 64 

X.  The  Care  of  Schoolbooks     ....  72 

XL  The  Schoolgirl's  Luncheon  ....  79 

XII.  Getting  Started  in  the  Morning     .      .  85 

XIII.  Home  Duties 92 

XIV.  The  Art  of  Cooking 100 

XV.  Skillful   Hands 109 

XVI.  Music 116 

XVII.  The  Schoolgirl's  Room 123 

XVIII.  Home  Study 129 

XIX.  Nature  Study 135 

XX.  False  Values 142 

XXI.  The  Schoolgirl's  Chum 149 

XXII.  Boy  Friends '.     .  156 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  PAGE 

XXIU.  Schoolgirls'   Clubs      .     .               .     .  164 

XXIV.  Courage 170 

XXV.  Repose 177 

XXVI.  Tact 183 

XXVII.  A  Gracious  Manner 191 

XXVIII.  The  Sweet- Voiced  Girl 199 

XXIX.  A  Good  Memory 207 

XXX.  Health 214 

XXXI.  The  Care  of  the  Eyes 222 

XXXII.  Dress 228 

XXXIII.  Magnifying  Troubles 234 

XXXIV.  Minor  Morals 241 

XXXV.  Promotion 248 

XXXVI.  The  President  of  Her  Class    ...  254 

XXXVII.  Commencement  Season 261 

XXXVIII.  A  Schoolgirl's  Calendar 266 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

CHAPTER  I 

THE    "  ALL-AROUND  "    SCHOOLGIRL 

TN  some  ways  you  girls  are  very  much 
alike;  in  some  others  you  are  different. 
But  there  is  not  one  of  you  who  can  afford 
to  pass  by  my  counsel  that  you  shall  become 
an  all-around  scholar. 

If  I  were  you  I  would  put  the  accent,  the 
emphasis,  of  all  my  school  work  on  the 
strong  word,  endeavor. 

I  would  endeavor  everywhere  and  at  all 
times  to  do  my  best.  It  might  be  that  my 
best  would  be  less  brilliant  than  the  best  of 
some  other  girl,  but  for  that  I  should  not 
care.  We  are  never  required  to  use  other 
people's  talents.  We  are  responsible  only 
for  the  use  we  make  of  our  own.  Faithful, 
diligent  work  done  over  and  over  every  day, 

9 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

in  the  schoolroom,  amounts  to  a  great  deal 
more  at  the  end  of  the  year  than  an  occa- 
sional spurt  in  which  we  make  a  great  ad- 
vance and  after  which  we  fall  back  into  in- 
dolence and  do  almost  nothing. 

I  have  seen  a  girl,  and  a  very  nice  girl, 
too,  throw  her  algebra  across  a  room  in  a 
fit  of  despair,  declaring  that  she  never  could 
understand  it  and  that  she  had  decided  it 
wasn't  worth  while  any  longer  to  try.  I 
have  seen  a  girl  almost  in  tears  over  her  com- 
position, affirming  that  she  had  not  a  thought 
in  her  head  and  would  not  know  how  to  ex- 
press it  if  she  had.  I  have  even  known  girls 
whose  spelling  was  atrocious,  a  perfect  dis- 
grace, who  calmly  stated  that  correct 
spelling  was  beyond  them  and  that  their  gifts 
lay  In  some  other  direction. 

Every  teacher  has  names  on  her  roll  over 
which  she  frowns  and  sighs,  knowing  that 
they  stand  for  pupils  who  are  quite  con- 
tented with  second-best  or  third-best  marks, 
and  whose  rating  is  away  down  at  D  when 
it  ought  to  be  at  A.  Such  girls  simply  fall 
down  in  a  heap  before  the  studies  they  don't 
10 


THE  "ALL-AROUND"  GIRL 

like  or  don't  enjoy;  the  studies  that  for  them 
mean  earnest  work  and  perhaps  a  hard  bat- 
tle, and  they  are  not  ashamed  merely  to 
escape  failure  and  be  pulled  through  a  rather 
lenient  examination  at  the  close  of  the  term. 
Elizabeth  would  not  do  this  as  a  matter  of 
course,  nor  would  Evelyn  or  Kathleen  or 
Dorothy.  I  hope,  and  indeed  I  know,  that 
you  are  far  above  such  slip-shod  methods  of 
study,  but  girls  with  names  just  as  lovely  are 
often  enough  deficient  along  these  lines.  It 
happens  in  this  way.  We  do  not  know  the 
real  value  of  golden  talents. 

Suppose  we  divide  our  talents  under  three 
heads.  We  may  have  golden  talents,  silver 
talents  and  leaden  talents.  The  golden  tal- 
ents are  those  we  most  desire,  but  we  do  not 
always  get  them  by  nature.  A  girl  with  a 
leaden  talent  may  change  it  after  awhile,  if 
she  is  faithful  and  painstaking  and  plodding, 
for  a  talent  of  silver,  and  a  girl  whose  talents 
originally  were  silver  may  in  the  progress  of 
her  school  years  have  them  transmuted  to 
gold.  Rough  ore  must  go  through  a  good 
many  severe  processes  before  it  can  be 
II 


changed  into  beautiful  articles  for  daily  use. 

One  girl  in  your  class  has  a  talent  which 
almost  amounts  to  genius  for  English  litera- 
ture. She  pursues  that  with  ardor  and  is  at 
the  top  of  the  class,  but  she  has  no  special 
turn  for  mathematical  study  and  has  to  be 
dragged  through  it  by  main  force.  An- 
other girl  has  a  passion  for  figures,  finds 
them  absorbing  and  easy,  and  without  much 
effort  carries  off  all  the  honors.  As  for 
geography,  botany,  rhetoric  and  physics,  she 
is  quite  resigned  to  a  mediocre  standard  in 
them,  and,  though  successful  in  spots,  she, 
like  her  friend,  is  anything  but  an  all-around 
scholar. 

The  fact  is  —  and  I  want  every  one  of  my 
girls  to  listen  —  the  object  of  your  school 
life  is  preparation  for  to-morrow.  The 
knowledge  you  gain  to-day  is  by  way  of  a 
foundation  for  to-morrow's  building.  Only 
a  little  while  from  now  you  girls  will  be  in 
the  doorway  of  a  bright  and  charming  fu- 
ture, with  all  sorts  of  opportunities  pressing 
upon  you.  Your  to-morrow  will  be  bright 

12 


THE  "ALL-AROUND"  GIRL 

and  glad,  full  of  duties,  full  of  pleasures  and 
full  of  responsibility. 

School  life  is  your  time  for  getting  ready 
so  that  when  you  enter  on  a  more  inde- 
pendent season  of  life,  you  may  rise  to  its 
importance.  The  all-around  scholar  of  the 
present  will  one  day  be  the  all-around 
woman  in  business,  in  a  profession,  in  society, 
or,  best  of  all,  in  the  household.  Nowhere 
else  can  an  all-around  girl  be  so  useful  and 
so  lovable  as  in  her  home.  I  wish  that  the 
girls  I  write  for  and  to  whom  I  am  talking 
might  every  one  be  the  sweetest  home  daugh- 
ters in  the  wide  world. 

One  of  the  essentials  of  happy  and  success- 
ful womanhood  is  that  women  should  be 
interesting.  A  dull,  commonplace,  unre- 
sponsive woman  may  have  a  pretty  face  and 
a  good  figure,  but  notwithstanding  her  beauty 
people  will  soon  grow  tired  of  her  and  seek 
other  company.  One  cannot  be  interesting 
unless  she  has  both  sympathy  and  informa- 
tion. 

A  girl  who  has  made  herself  familiar  with 
several  fields  of  learning  and  who  has  a  well- 

13 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

disciplined  mind  may  not  always  be  able  to 
talk  brightly,  but  she  will  know  how  to  listen 
intelligently.  Better  still,  she  will  know 
when  to  keep  still,  an  invaluable  bit  of 
knowledge  for  a  woman. 

Old  people  will  find  this  girl  charming 
and  considerate.  Busy  men  will  feel  rested 
in  her  presence,  and  as  for  her  father  and 
mother,  they  will  be  repaid  in  her  sweet, 
bright  and  useful  girlhood  for  the  sacrifices 
they  made  when  she  was  in  the  schoolroom. 
Many  parents  have  to  deny  themselves  far 
more  than  their  children  dream  that  the  chil- 
dren may  be  educated.  They  are  always  re- 
paid in  full  by  the  children  who  are  devel- 
oped in  an  all-around  fashion. 


CHAPTER  II 

PLUCK,    PERSEVERANCE    AND    PUNCTUALITY 


evening  last  autumn  I  had  the  pleas- 
ure  of  being  a  guest  in  a  great  school 
for  girls.  The  school  building  which  is  am- 
ple and  beautiful,  stands  on  a  hill-top  and 
all  around  it  are  acres  of  garden  and  meadow, 
with  a  lake  where  the  girls  row  in  summer 
and  skate  in  winter;  trees  under  which  they 
walk  and  every  beautiful  condition  that  can 
make  the  surroundings  ideal.  Within,  the 
accommodations  match  the  fair  outside,  and 
I  have  rarely  seen  anything  more  beautiful 
than  the  assemblage  of  those  girls  in  chapel 
at  their  vesper  service.  To  me  the  hour  I 
liked  best  was  one  at  the  close  of  the  day, 
when  I  sat  in  the  middle  of  a  crowd  of  girls, 
a  few  seated  on  chairs  and  sofas,  but  most  on 
the  floor,  a  throng  of  bright  faces,  eager  and 
responsive,  that  I  shall  never  forget. 

15 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

Looking  at  these  winsome  schoolgirls,  I 
seemed  to  see  beyond  them  a  much  larger 
throng.  To  this  great  company  of  girls  who 
shall  presently  be  the  young  women  of  the 
future,  I  have  a  little  sermon  to  preach. 
The  old-fashioned  way  was  to  divide  ser- 
mons under  three  heads.  I  am  taking  this 
way,  and  my  first  head  is 

PLUCK 

Unless  a  girl  has  pluck,  she  will  find  her- 
self many  a  time  at  odds  with  life.  It  re- 
quires pluck  of  no  mean  order  to  sit  in  a 
dentist's  chair  and  endure  the  agony  known 
as  treating  a  tooth.  It  requires  pluck  to  go 
with  a  little  sister  or  brother  to  this  same 
friendly  adjunct  of  the  family,  and  sit  by 
while  the  little  victim  has  teeth  straightened 
or  a  tooth  removed.  Pluck  is  far  more  nec- 
essary when  the  difficulty  is  not  merely  phys- 
ical, but  is  moral  and  calls  for  the  kind 
of  courage  that  makes  one  bear  reproof  pa- 
tiently, or  speak  the  truth  when  to  do  so  may 
make  one  unpopular.  Without  real,  genuine 
pluck  few  of  us  can  get  through  the  day's 
16 


PLUCK  AND  PERSEVERANCE 

work  with  credit.  Sometimes  pluck  is  need- 
ful when  one  has  to  wear  much-mended 
gloves  or  a  shabby  gown,  or  when  one  faces 
the  fact  that  she  cannot  have  the  luxuries 
that  are  as  common  as  air  and  water  in  the 
experience  of  her  neighbor.  Pluck  is  not 
given  to  us  at  birth.  Some  of  us  are 
naturally  great  cowards.  We  shrink  from 
pain  and  trouble  of  every  variety,  and  want 
a  cushioned  seat  for  every  journey.  For- 
tunately, pluck  may  be  acquired.  If  we 
have  not  very  much  to  begin  with  we  may 
easily  get  more  by  the  simple  method  of  cul- 
tivating what  we  have.  I  would  have  my 
girls  brave  and  fearless,  feeling  perfectly 
sure  of  their  ground,  if  they  are  in  the  right, 
and  dreading  nothing  except  being  in  the 
wrong. 

PERSEVERANCE 

You  all  remember  the  little  rhyme  that  you 
were  taught  almost  as  soon  as  the  alphabet, 
"  If  at  first  you  don't  succeed,  try,  try, 
again."  The  lesson  in  this  bit  of  homely 
verse  is  one  for  you  and  me.  Beginnings 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

are  easy  enough;  we  start  out  with  a  fair 
wind  and  a  flowing  sail,  and  our  boat  goes 
dancing  over  the  waves,  but  the  true  test 
comes  when  we  have  to  row  against  wind  and 
tide,  or  to  manage  our  course  when  the 
storms  beat  and  the  winds  rave.  To  drop 
the  metaphor,  most  of  us  enjoy  taking  the 
initiative  with  a  new  study  or  a  new  enter- 
prise. Our  commencement  is  with  enthu- 
siasm, but  presently  we  reach  irregular  verbs, 
or  abstruse  problems,  and  our  ardor  dampens. 
Very  likely  some  of  you  could  show,  if  you 
chose,  beautiful  pieces  of  embroidery  and 
knitting  on  which  you  have  made  a  fair  start. 
The  place  that  tires  one  and  tries  one's  met- 
tle is  in  the  middle  of  the  road,  or  the  middle 
of  the  task.  Those  who  begin  well,  keep  on 
well,  and  finish  well,  gain  the  laurels  and 
wear  them  with  honor. 

Perseverance  tells  on  your  monthly  or 
quarterly  reports  as  examinations  never  do. 
The  real  test  of  ability  in  any  line  is  just 
here:  Is  the  student  easily  daunted  or  does 
she  hold  fast  with  an  iron  grip  until  she  has 
accomplished  what  she  undertakes? 
18 


PLUCK  AND  PERSEVERANCE 

As  our  favorite  Longfellow  sings: 

"  Let  us,  then,  be  up  and  doing, 
With  a  heart  for  any  fate; 

Still  achieving,  still  pursuing, 
Learn  to  labor  and  to  wait." 

The  twin  sister  of  perseverance  is  patience. 
You  remember,  do  you  not,  the  old  fairy 
stories  in  which  the  little  princess  was  set  to 
unravel  a  terribly  tangled  skein,  and  how  she 
made  no  headway  until  a  fairy  named  Pa- 
tience came  and  helped  her  straighten  out  the 
threads,  and  lay  them  side  by  side?  Let 
your  fairy  be  named  Perseverance,  and  if  her 
sister  comes  to  help  her,  give  a  welcome  to 
them  both. 

PUNCTUALITY 

Of  the  three  p's,  punctuality  is  probably 
the  most  important,  because,  you  see,  if  you 
are  not  punctual,  you  are  a  thief.  It  is  a 
dreadful  thing  to  be  a  thief.  Hosts  of  peo- 
ple who  would  not  steal  diamonds  or  gold 
or  break  into  houses  or  pick  pockets,  have 
no  hesitation  whatever  in  robbing  others  of 
something  as  precious,  namely,  time.  When 
19 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

you  fail  to  keep  an  engagement  at  the  right 
moment,  when  you  come  dawdling  in  five 
or  ten  minutes  late,  whether  it  be  a  recitation, 
a  committee  meeting  or  any  other  appoint- 
ment, you  have  wasted  what  did  not  belong 
to  you  —  the  time  of  other  and  busy  folk. 
We  prove  that  we  can  be  punctual  whenever 
we  catch  a  train  that  is  scheduled  to  leave  the 
station  at  a  certain  hour.  Knowing  well 
that  trains  do  not  await  the  convenience  of 
passengers,  or  ocean  steamers  tarry  at  the 
wharf  a  moment  after  the  hour  fixed  for  sail- 
ing, we  are  punctual  if  we  are  starting  on  a 
journey  or  a  voyage;  but  we  are  much  less 
apt  to  be  punctual,  for  instance,  about  enter- 
ing church  in  season,  or  reaching  a  friend's 
home  at  the  moment  we  were  asked. 

To  be  late  at  dinner,  as  everyone  knows, 
is  an  unpardonable  sin,  and  when  you  are  old 
enough  to  be  dinner  guests  you  will  discover 
that  you  must  be  punctual  then.  Try  to  be 
punctual  now.  It  is  quite  as  easy  to  be  a 
little  in  advance  of  one's  daily  engagements 
as  to  be  a  little  behind.  Never  allow  your- 
self to  be  spoken  of  as  the  tardy  Miss  Emily, 
20 


PLUCK  AND  PERSEVERANCE 

or  the  late  Miss  Alice.  Pride  yourself  on 
being  known  as  one  who  is  as  punctual  as 
the  sun. 

May  I  say  a  word  about  the  start  in  the 
morning?  If  one  dislikes  getting  up  and 
dressing  and  being  ready  for  breakfast  in 
good  season,  and  if  she  yields  to  her  dislike, 
it  is  more  than  probable  that  she  will  lose 
time  all  day  long.  One  never  catches  up 
with  that  half  hour  that  was  wasted  in  a  nap 
after  the  rising  bell  had  rung.  The  morn- 
ing hour  has  gold  in  its  mouth. 


21 


CHAPTER  III 

THE    UNPOPULAR   SCHOOLGIRL 

VJT7HEN  you  tell  me  that  you  cannot  win 
your  way  in  school  because  the  teacher 
is  hateful  and  the  girls  are  horrid  and  no- 
body likes  you,  I  cannot  help  thinking  that 
the  fault  must  somehow  lie  with  you.  You 
tell  me  with  a  very  mournful  look  that  you 
are  unpopular.  Mary  is  popular,  and  so  is 
Jane.  But  you,  with  every  reason  that  they 
have  for  being  liked  by  the  class  and  the 
teacher,  are  left  out  in  the  cold  and  have  be- 
gun to  feel  that  you  will  always  have  to  stay 
on  the  edge  of  things  while  other  girls  are  in 
the  middle. 

Naturally  some  girls  get  on  faster  than 
others  in  a  new  environment.  There  is 
Margaret  who  is  so  magnetic,  so  sweetly  at- 
tractive that  everyone  falls  in  love  with  her 
gentleness  and  grace.  There  is  Stella,  whose 

22 


THE  UNPOPULAR  GIRL 

scholarship  is  so  accurate  that  teachers  feel 
delighted  to  have  her  at  her  desk  when  they 
are  explaining  lessons,  or  conducting  recita- 
tions. There  is  Eva,  who  is  never  at  a  loss 
for  the  right  word,  and  who  never  is  both- 
ered with  her  hands  and  feet  as  some  girls 
are  with  theirs. 

It  is  not  really  worth  while  to  look  too 
long  at  those  fortunate  girls,  the  trouble  be- 
ing, in  your  case,  that  you  do  not  belong  to 
that  group. 

May  it  not  be  that  you  are  over  critical? 
Occasionally  a  schoolgirl  falls  into  a  habit  of 
saying  disagreeable  things  about  other  girls, 
and  putting  wrong  constructions  on  their 
motives.  We  have  all  seen  the  girl  who  is 
ready  to  say  something  mean  about  her 
neighbor,  and  who  stoops  to  the  greater 
meanness  of  saying  uncharitable  things  about 
those  who  are  absent.  If  you  do  this,  you 
cannot  expect  that  people  in  general  will  be 
very  fond  of  you. 

I  have  seen  girls  who  prided  themselves 
so  much  upon  being  candid  and  telling  the 
truth  that  people  were  actually  afraid  of 

23 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

them.  They  use  the  truth  as  a  boy  throws 
stones.  One  never  knew  when  some  hard  lit- 
tle pellet  would  hit  one  in  the  face. 

For  example,  a  girl  may  have  entirely  too 
good  a  memory.  The  girl  whose  habit  is 
the  instant  she  hears  something  told,  to 
make  a  face  of  surprise  and  say  in  a  shocked 
tone,  "  Why,  last  week  you  expressed  an  en- 
tirely different  opinion,"  or,  who  makes  a 
point  of  telling  her  friends  on  all  occasions 
precisely  what  she  thinks  of  them,  may  be  a 
very  good  girl,  but  she  will  never  be  popular. 

Please  observe  that  we  are  always  to  tell 
the  truth  if  we  are  obliged  to  speak,  but  there 
are  many  times  when  it  is  much  more  a  duty 
to  be  silent  than  it  is  to  speak.  All  truth  is 
not  always  to  be  told.  You  need  not  go  out 
of  your  way  to  inform  Sally  Brown  that  a 
green  dress  does  not  suit  her  complexion  and 
makes  her  look  yellow,  if  she  has  just  bought 
one,  nor  is  it  your  place  to  make  Louise  Jones 
uncomfortable  by  commenting  on  the  unbe- 
coming style  of  her  new  hat,  which  she  must 
wear  all  winter. 

A  good  rule  all  through  life  is  to  say 
24 


THE  UNPOPULAR  GIRL 

agreeable  things  whenever  one  can,  and  dis- 
agreeable things  only  when  one  must.  No 
girl  will  ever  be  popular  who  has  no  tact. 
The  tactful  girl  is  more  likely  to  be  a  favorite 
than  the  beautiful,  the  generous  or  the  clever 
girl,  who  lacks  this  quality. 

The  self-centered  girl,  too,  is  likely  to  be 
unpopular.  She  sees  things  exclusively  as 
they  affect  herself.  She  is  so  occupied  with 
what  she  wishes  to  do,  with  her  own  plans, 
ambitions  and  ends,  that  there  is  no  room 
beside  her  fire  for  anybody  else  to  sit  down. 
This  girl  always  makes  herself  comfortable 
and  does  not  care  a  fig  whether  or  not  others 
suffer.  In  a  street  car,  she  pounces  upon  the 
best  vacant  seat,  and  never  thinks  of  offering 
it  to  an  elderly  lady  or  a  woman  burdened 
with  a  child,  or  anybody  else  who  looks  tired 
or  worn.  She  sends  her  brothers  and  sisters 
all  over  the  house  on  her  errands,  but  it  does 
not  occur  to  her  to  run  upstairs  for  the  book 
her  mother  is  reading,  the  shawl  her  grand- 
mother needs,  or  the  box  of  toys  that  may 
amuse  a  visiting  youngster.  She  does  not 
mean  to  be  selfish,  and  she  very  willingly 

25 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

divides  a  treat  with  or  spends  money  for  her 
friends,  but  she  thinks,  primarily,  of  number 
one.  Take  care  of  number  one  is  her  maxim. 
Nobody  who  makes  this  her  life  motto  will 
ever  have  many  friends. 

Another  thing  that  makes  a  girl  unpopular 
is  affectation.  This  is  especially  a  girl's  de- 
fect. One  hardly  ever  sees  it  in  a  boy. 
Your  brother  may  be  a  tease,  or  a  torment; 
he  may  be  rough  and  clumsy;  he  may  pro- 
voke you  by  forgetting  his  manners,  but  he 
is  not  apt  to  put  on  the  airs  of  other  people. 
He  will  be  just  himself. 

But  girls  sometimes  purposely  and  some- 
times unconsciously  imitate  those  around 
them,  and  in  speech  and  behavior  are  not  quite 
genuine.  Nobody  can  have  very  much  pa- 
tience with  an  affected  girl;  a  girl  on  whom 
one  cannot  count,  who  poses  and  acts  a 
part.  You  would  better  ask  yourself  if  you 
are  always  simple  and  sincere  and  willing  to 
be  the  plain,  honest  girl  that  your  mother 
knows  and  your  father  loves  with  such  pride, 
because  if  you  are,  the  girls  will  presently 
begin  to  love  you,  too. 
26 


THE  UNPOPULAR  GIRL 

Real  people  who  belong  to  the  realities  of 
life,  and  who  are  not  trying  to  masquerade 
in  characters  that  are  not  their  own,  are  al- 
most always  sure  of  gaining  esteem,  and  after 
esteem  comes  affection.  A  pleasing  individu- 
ality wins  friends. 

There  is  just  the  possibility  that  the  girl 
who  mourns  because  she  is  unpopular  cares 
too  much  about  it,  and  is  too  anxious  to  have 
the  conspicuous  places.  Your  older  sister 
could  tell  you  of  a  girl  in  her  class  in  college, 
who  was  lovely,  provided  she  could  be 
pushed  into  a  position  of  leadership.  If 
only  everyone  would  look  up  to  her,  ask  what 
she  thought,  and  give  her  the  casting  vote, 
nobody  could  compare  with  her  in  courtesy. 
But  pass  her  over,  ask  her  next  door  neigh- 
bor to  walk  with  you,  or  take  the  chair  at  a 
committee  meeting,  and  this  girl  froze  and 
was  as  cold  and  distant  and  hard  and  unre- 
sponsive as  an  ice-bound  brook  in  January. 
Let  her  lead,  and  she  was  fascinating;  omit 
her  from  the  program  and  she  immediately 
became  a  sphynx.  A  girl  who  is  bound  to  be 
foremost  at  any  cost  may  be  admired,  but  she 
27 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

will  not  be  the  most  dearly  loved  girl  in  her 
class. 

If  I  were  you,  I  would  not  worry  any  more 
about  this  thing  that  has  been  causing  you  to 
look  pensive  and  have  drooping  lines  about 
your  mouth  and  wear  a  grieved  and  martyr- 
like  expression.  Popularity  is  very  well,  if 
it  comes  unsought,  and  as  the  reward  of 
goodness,  kindness  and  unselfishness.  But  it 
is  not  the  thing  best  worth  trying  for. 

Sometimes  it  is  a  disgrace  to  be  popular. 
If  one  becomes  popular  through  courting 
other  people's  favor  and  doing  what  is  called 
toadying,  she  has  no  reason  to  be  proud;  she 
ought  rather  to  blush.  A  girl  who  is  true 
and  loving  and  gentle,  considerate,  thought- 
ful and  ready  to  do  the  next  thing  for  the 
next  person,  with  that  politeness  which  springs 
from  a  good  heart,  need  not  be  afraid  that 
she  will  ever  be  the  unpopular  girl  in  her 
circle. 


28 


CHAPTER  IV 

PERPLEXING   STUDIES 

T^OROTHY  and  I  have  had  an  argu- 
ment. She  declares  that  it  is  not 
worth  while  to  work  hard  at  a  thing  she  can- 
not understand,  and  frankly  despises.  De- 
spises is  a  strong  word,  but  I  have  noticed 
that  Dorothy  and  other  girls  in  the  sunny- 
land  of  the  early  teens  are  a  wee  bit  given  to 
the  use  of  strong  expression.  Perhaps  they 
don't  intend  to  exaggerate  and  perhaps  they 
do  feel  that  they  must  underscore  their  words 
with  vigorous  emphasis  or  else  their  listeners 
will  only  laugh.  It  is  a  great  trial  to  girls 
that  grown  people,  people  fifteen  or  twenty 
years  older  than  they,  so  generally  seem  to 
find  them  amusing  and  decline  to  take  them 
seriously. 

However,  I  do  take  Dorothy  seriously,  and 
when  she  tells  me  that  she  despises  partial 
payments  and  loathes  complex  fractions,  and 
29 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

never  can  find  her  way  through  the  puzzling 
labyrinth  of  compound  interest,  I  feel  very 
much  like  shaking  hands  with  her.  I  am  not 
ashamed  to  tell  you  that  I  have  had  my  own 
troubles  over  those  very  things.  They  are 
puzzling  enough  let  who  may  tell  us  the  con- 
trary. Yet  I  am  reluctant  to  believe  that 
there  is  anything  in  the  region  of  school 
study  that  a  clever  girl  cannot  understand, 
cannot  conquer,  and  cannot  make  her  own,  if 
only  she  sets  her  will  resolutely  to  the  task, 
and  gives  it  her  full  and  undivided  attention. 
What  girls  have  done,  girls  may  do,  and  I 
for  one  am  always  sorry  when  I  see  a  girl 
ready  to  confess  herself  defeated. 

I  once  knew  a  very  successful  teacher.  He 
was  so  enthusiastic  about  teaching,  so  mag- 
netic, so  full  of  fiery  energy  and  of  contagious 
fun  that  to  be  in  one  of  his  classes  was  a  de- 
light difficult  to  describe.  He  compelled 
every  girl  to  do  her  best  and  he  left  the 
schoolroom  at  the  end  of  the  day  with  a  con- 
viction not  only  that  he  had  done  the  best  he 
could  for  his  pupils,  but  that  they  had  will- 
ingly done  their  best  for  him.  One  day  I 

30 


PERPLEXING  STUDIES 


questioned  him.  "  Professor  Blank,  which 
do  you  prefer,  a  clever  girl  or  a  stupid  girl? 
Where  do  you  work  hardest?  " 

He  answered  with  a  smile  that  lit  up  the 
dark  rugged  face.  "  How  can  you  ask? 
The  clever  girls  are  bound  to  learn;  they  do 
not  especially  interest  me  or  call  forth  my 
efforts.  I  find  my  greatest  pleasure  in  teach- 
ing the  girls  whom  you  call  stupid,  but  who 
simply  haven't  got  hold  of  their  work  at  the 
right  end.  I  like  to  draw  them  out.  I 
like  to  show  them  what  they  can  become.  I 
like  to  help  them  up  their  hills  of  difficulty. 
There  is  twice  the  reward  in  teaching  a  dull 
pupil  that  there  is  in  teaching  a  bright  one. 
You  see  it  is  usually  the  case  that  the  dull 
ones  only  need  waking  up  and  that  when  they 
are  awake,  they  go  on  famously,  while  the 
others  acquire  with  such  ease  that  they  are 
soon  satisfied  and  their  efforts  flag." 

I  have  never  been  quite  sure  in  my  own 
mind  about  the  professor's  conclusions.  I  my- 
self enjoy  clever,  keen-witted,  sparkling  girls 
like  Dorothy  and  her  sister  Elizabeth,  but 
then,  too,  I  am  very  fond  of  girls  of  an  oppo- 

31 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

site  type;  girls  like  Janet  and  Nellie,  who 
have  to  work  very  faithfully  for  all  they  get 
in  the  schoolroom.  I  suppose  the  truth  is 
that  girls  appeal  to  me  just  because  they  are 
girls.  One  thing  I  know,  and  that  is  that  if 
anybody,  clever  or  dull,  wishes  to  attain  a 
high  rank  in  study,  she  must  grind.  Let  me 
put  it  in  capitals  —  GRIND  ! .  Work  hard- 
est where  you  are  least  attracted.  There  is 
no  particular  credit  to  be  attached  to  you  if 
you  learn  with  facility.  A  veteran  editor 
told  me  one  day  that  the  fatal  flaw  in  the 
work  of  nine-tenths  of  the  youthful  con- 
tributors to  his  magazine  was  their  facility. 
"  They  do  sketchy  things  and  slovenly  things 
and  superficial  things,"  he  said,  "  because 
they  have  never  learned  the  value  of  real 
work." 

Girls,  a  tiny  diamond  flashing  like  a  dew- 
drop  in  the  sun,  or  a  single  lustrous  pearl, 
or  green  emerald  holding  the  tints  of  the 
deep  sea  in  its  flashing  heart,  is  worth  a  cart- 
load of  rhinestones.  A  very  little  bit  of  gold 
is  worth  more  than  a  yard  of  gold  leaf. 
What  you  win  by  resolute  effort  is  yours  for- 
32 


PERPLEXING  STUDIES 


ever.  You  have  not  only  gained  a  certain 
amount  of  knowledge,  you  have  not  only 
mastered  a  certain  theory,  or  found  out  how 
to  state  a  certain  proposition,  but  you  have 
mastered  yourself,  you  have  made  your  mind 
obey  you,  and  you  have  become  the  readier 
to  undertake  the  next  thing  that  dares  to 
baffle  you. 

I  wouldn't,  if  I  were  Dorothy,  say  quite 
so  broadly  that  I  despised  what  I  did  not 
understand.  There  is  many  a  mystery  that 
unfolds  itself  to  us  in  strange  beauty,  once 
we  have  penetrated  beyond  its  gates.  There 
are  numbers  of  things  that  never  reveal  to  us 
their  secrets  simply  because  we  have  not 
learned  their  alphabet. 

I  cannot  believe  that  any  schoolgirl  of  to- 
day would  unwillingly  endure  to  be  classed 
among  the  lazy  and  the  heedless  and  the  triv- 
ial souls,  who  never  see  an  inch  of  the  way 
before  them.  In  your  last  vacation,  when 
you  went  to  the  mountains,  you  started  one 
morning  on  a  long  jaunt.  You  walked  and 
climbed  and  toiled  up  a  steep  and  brier- 
haunted  path,  scrambling  here,  slipping  there, 

33 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

now  falling  back,  now  advancing,  but  always 
getting  a  little  higher  up.  After  awhile  you 
reached  a  place  far  up  the  mountainside, 
where  there  was  a  grassy  plane  and  there  you 
stopped  to  rest.  You  were  paid  for  all  your 
trouble  by  the  magnificent  prospect  that  lay 
before  you.  It  is  always  worth  while  to 
climb,  girls,  and  there  is  never  disappoint- 
ment when  you  have  reached  the  heights,  but 
sometimes  there  is  hard  work  before  you  get 
there.  Usually  you  will  find  all  through  life 
that  she  is  best  paid  who  works  hardest  at 
what  she  does  not  so  very  much  enjoy  for 
the  moment.  The  time  for  enjoyment  comes 
when  one  has  gained  the  victory. 


34 


CHAPTER  V 

THE    LESSONS   YOU    DON'T    LIKE 

OOME  girls  dislike  all  lessons.  They 
would  shed  no  tears  if  they  never  again 
had  to  memorize  or  recite;  if  lessons  were 
left  wholly  out  of  their  calendar  from  this 
time  onward.  I  hope  you  do  not  belong  to 
their  company,  or  that,  if  you  do,  you  will 
make  haste  to  leave  it. 

There  was  Molly  Sue,  a  girl  I  knew  when 
she  was  sixteen,  pretty,  soft-mannered,  sweet- 
voiced,  but,  oh!  so  lazy!  She  drifted 
through  successive  schools  without  learning 
anything,  always  playing  the  role  of  a  good- 
natured,  irresponsible  shirk.  Her  kittenish 
ways  and  dainty  sweetness  won  her  far  too 
many  excuses  from  her  teachers,  and  among 
her  friends  the  feeling  was  well  expressed  by 
an  artist,  who  said:  "  Molly  Sue  does  not 
need  to  know  anything.  It  is  quite  enough 

35 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

to  look  at  her,  as  one  looks  at  a  perfect 
flower." 

But  Molly  Sue  did  not  stay  sixteen.  She 
grew  out  of  girlhood  as  you  will,  too,  and 
after  awhile  people  forgot  to  notice  her  when 
she  was  in  the  room  with  those  who  had 
brains  and  ideas.  The  perfect  beauty  faded. 
She  became  a  withered  rose.  The  vacant 
mind  was  like  a  dusty  lumber-room  full  of 
rubbish.  It  was  all  the  greater  pity,  for  if 
somebody  had  taken  Molly  Sue  by  the  shoul- 
ders and  shaken  her  out  of  her  indolence 
when  she  was  a  schoolgirl,  she  might  have 
grown  up  an  interesting  woman. 

It  is  your  positive  duty,  dear  girl,  to  so 
train  mind,  heart,  will  and  disposition  that 
you  shall  be  neither  stupid,  silly,  insipid  nor 
tedious  when  you  are  older.  An  interesting 
woman,  clever,  enthusiastic,  keen  and  respon- 
sive, is  more  to  be  desired  than  a  beautiful 
woman;  and  is  more  attractive  in  her  home. 
She  will  more  deeply  impress  society. 

Of  course  this  girl  was  an  exception.  Most 
girls  conquer  their  inertia  and  study  after  a 
fashion;  fortunately  most  girls  have  a  share 

36 


LESSONS  YOU  DON'T  LIKE 

of  common  sense.  Even  reluctantly  ac- 
quired knowledge  is  better  than  none  at  all. 

What  I  want  to  urge  upon  you  is  to  put 
the  emphasis  of  your  efforts  on  the  studies 
you  don't  like.  We  all  have  studies  we  love, 
and  it  is  easy  to  pursue  them.  For  instance, 
Dorothy,  who  enjoys  her  English  work,  finds 
no  difficulty  in  keeping  at  the  head  of  her 
class,  but  when  the  question  is  of  mathematics 
she  gropes  about  in  the  dark.  If  you  will 
glance  over  your  classmates,  you  will  have  no 
trouble  in  picking  out  a  half  dozen  Doro- 
thys. Some  of  them  come  out  splendidly  in 
history  and  are  dull  in  physics;  some  shine 
in  Latin,  and  cannot  tackle  the  simplest  alge- 
braic problem.  The  point  for  every  such 
girl,  don't  you  think,  is  to  spend  strength  and 
time  and  really  hard  work  on  the  book,  the 
subject,  the  situation,  that  she  has  no  particu- 
lar aptitude  for?  The  things  one  likes  one 
acquires  without  painstaking,  but  it  is  pains- 
taking that  rewards  one  in  the  end. 

I  don't  think  there  is  a  pleasure  in  the 
world  that  can  be  compared  with  an  honest 
joy  in  conquering  a  difficult  task.  It  is  by 

37 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

hard  work  over  what  one  does  not  enjoy  that 
one  gains  that  mastery  of  the  will  and  facility 
of  the  mind  that  make  the  true  distinction  be- 
tween the  educated  and  the  uneducated  per- 
son. Natural  cleverness  is  a  good  quality. 
But  a  better  one  is  downright,  sturdy,  dogged 
perseverance,  that  never  lets  go,  once  it  has 
started  on  any  line  of  work. 

A  schoolgirl  should  take  stock  of  her  own 
capacity.  There  is  an  old  story  of  a  pre- 
ceptress who  wrote  to  the  rich  parent  of  a 
very  dull  pupil,  that  his  daughter  lacked 
capacity.  "  Buy  her  one  immediately,"  tele- 
graphed the  man  of  affairs.  Alas !  gold  can- 
not buy  capacity.  No  outsider  can  give  it 
you.  But  you  can  buy  it  for  yourself. 

You,  Edith,  who  complain  that  you  can- 
not remember,  that  what  you  learn  to-day  is 
forgotten  to-morrow,  may  change  all  that,  if 
you  will  give  your  attention  to  one  thing  at 
a  time,  and  let  nobody  disturb  you.  Some 
girls  are  scatter-brained.  Don't  be  like  them. 
Fix  your  mind  on  a  single  word,  a  single  sen- 
tence, a  single  paragraph,  and  compel  it  to 
understand  that,  and  to  remember  it.  Mem- 
38 


LESSONS  YOU  DON'T  LIKE 

ory  is  a  slave  to  those  who  know  how  to  com- 
mand it  and  make  it  obey. 

You,  Rosamond,  who  have  no  trouble 
about  memorizing,  but  whose  hardship  is 
that  you  cannot  reason,  that  you  do  not  see 
into  things  clearly,  must  take  the  same  pre- 
scription. Be  contented  if  you  do  not  make 
very  rapid  progress,  but  concentrate  your 
thoughts  on  the  thing  in  hand.  "  Nothing 
can  stand  before  the  day's  work,"  said  a 
great  teacher.  Each  day's  work,  carefully 
done,  tells  wonderfully  on  the  work  of  a 
month  or  a  term. 

This  is  what  happens  to  you,  my  dear  girl, 
whoever  you  are.  It  has  happened  to  me 
many  a  time,  so  I  know  whereof  I  speak. 
Never  mind  the  locality;  a  girl  in  the  district 
school  in  the  woods,  a  girl  in  a  town,  a  girl 
with  every  appliance,  or  a  girl  with  few 
helps  may  have  the  same  experience.  You 
tug  along  dauntlessly.  It  is  uphill  work. 
You  slip  back  sometimes,  but  you  plant  your 
feet  again  firmly,  and  take  a  new  start.  You 
gain  a  little  ground  to-day;  a  little  more  to- 
morrow. Suddenly,  you  cannot  explain  how 
39 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

or  why,  the  difficulties  vanish,  the  husk  of 
trouble  falls  away,  and  out  comes  the  perfect 
flower,  white,  fragrant,  satisfying.  You 
could  not  see  yesterday,  but  you  see  to-day. 
You  had  no  vocabulary  last  week,  but  words 
crowd  on  you  now. 

A  girl  I  know  was  studying  a  new  lan- 
guage. She  kept  wailing  over  and  over: 
"  I  have  no  words.  I  have  no  words.  I 
have  to  find  out  every  word  I  want  in  the 
lexicon.  It  is  an  endless  task.  I  shall  never 
understand,  never  catch  up." 

All  at  once,  words  began  meeting  her  with 
friendly  faces.  They  were  no  longer 
strangers.  She  knew  their  inflections,  their 
cadences ;  the  vocabulary  of  another  language 
was  her  own.  Hard  work  had  brought  its 
reward.  "  Never  "  is  a  word  to  be  turned 
away  from  one's  door.  There  need  be  no 
such  word. 

School  honors  and  prizes  are  worth  striv- 
ing for.  The  girl  who  can  win  her  teacher's 
approval  is  always  enviable.  But,  on  the 
whole,  the  dull  girl  who  wins  it  with  effort  is 
more  enviable  than  the  bright  one  who  did 
40 


LESSONS  YOU  DON'T  LIKE 

not  try  hard.  And  I  believe  that  it  is  much 
more  pleasant  to  have  the  full  approval  of 
one's  personal  conscience,  to  know  that,  let 
happen  what  may,  one  has  done  one's  very 
best,  than  to  carry  off  marks  and  medals  and 
certificates. 

Some  of  you  are  handicapped  by  having 
too  many  studies  at  one  and  the  same  time. 
It  is  unwise  to  attempt  too  much.  If  the 
class  work  includes  more  lessons  than  you  can 
assimilate,  ask  to  have  some  of  them  dropped. 
Teachers  are  willing  to  aid  an  earnest  pupil 
who  is  doing  what  she  can  to  overcome  her 
own  deficiencies.  But  if  you  drop  something, 
let  it  be  the  thing  you  are  fond  of,  not  the 
thing  you  dislike.  The  study  you  care  for 
may  be  taken  up  at  any  time  in  the  future. 
The  other  must  be  faced  and  conquered  now, 
or  it  will  never  give  you  the  joy  of  victory. 
We  can  all  belong,  you  know,  to 

THE  COMPANY  WHO  TRY 

Yes,  I  love  the  youthful  winner, 
With  the  medal  and  the  mark; 

He  has  gained  the  prize  he  sought  for, 
He  is  joyous  as  a  lark. 

41 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

Every  one  will  haste  to  praise  him  ; 

He  is  on  the  honor  list. 
I  Ve  a  tender  thought,  my  darlings, 

For  the  one  who  tried,  and  missed. 

One?     Ah,  me!  they  count,  by  thousands, 

Those  who  have  not  gained  the  race, 
Though  they  did  their  best  and  fairest, 

Striving  for  the  winner's  place. 
Only  few  can  reach  the  laurel ; 

Many  see  their  chance  flit  by. 
I  Ve  a  tender  thought,  my  darlings, 

For  the  earnest  band  who  try. 

'T  is  the  trying  that  is  noble, 

If  you  're  made  of  sterner  stuff 
Than  the  laggards  who  are  daunted 

When  the  bit  of  road  is  rough. 
All  will  praise  the  happy  winners ; 

But  when  they  have  hurried  by, 
I  Ve  a  song  to  cheer,  my  darlings, 

The  great  company  who  try. 


42 


CHAPTER  VI 

MATHEMATICS 

T  DON'T  blame  you  much,  Dorothy,  for 
your  great  dislike  of  mathematics.  I 
have  never  particularly  enjoyed  studying 
them  for  my  own  part,  and  I  have  always 
looked  with  respectful  wonder  and  almost 
awe  on  other  people  who  have  professed  to 
find  them  delightful. 

Yet,  my  dear,  the  girl  next  you  in  the  class 
may  approach  this  subject  in  a  quite  different 
mood  from  yours.  She  may  fully  enjoy  the 
abstract  and  concrete  principles  of  the  science 
of  numbers;  may  fairly  revel  in  difficult  prop- 
ositions, and  may  regard  the  hour  for  alge- 
bra, trigonometry  or  whatever  else  it  may 
be  as  the  most  exhilarating  hour  of  the  day. 
Not  infrequently  two  sisters  may  be  entirely 
in  contrast  when  the  question  concerns  this 
abstruse  and,  on  the  whole,  formidable  study ; 

43 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

one  may  love  it  as  much  as  the  other  loathes 
it.  You  need  not  expect  to  receive  much 
help  from  the  people  at  home  when  you  are 
puzzling  over  diagrams,  examples  and  prob- 
lems in  mathematics.  Most  of  us,  after  our 
school  days,  remember  enough  of  what  we 
learned  there  to  enable  us  to  foot  up  house- 
hold accounts,  and  to  see  that  we  do  not  over- 
run our  weekly  or  monthly  income.  But  we 
do  not  retain  much  more. 

If  we  are  thoughtless  persons,  we  are  apt 
to  regret  that  we  were  compelled  to  spend  a 
lot  of  time  over  things  we  did  not  like  when 
there  were  so  many  other  things  that  would 
have  given  us  a  great  deal  of  pleasure. 

But  stop  a  moment  before  you  condemn 
your  teachers  for  insisting  on  making  mathe- 
matics the  test  of  your  scholarship.  In  the 
first  place,  it  is  good  for  most  of  us  to  do 
what  we  don't  very  much  want  to  do.  We 
are  better  for  being  compelled  to  exercise 
some  self-denial.  You  and  I  are  bound  to 
meet  obstacles  of  one  sort  or  another  all 
along  the  road  of  life.  If  we  are  cowards, 
we  shall  shiver  and  shake  and  turn  away  and 
44 


MATHEMATICS 


look  for  some  little  by-path  by  which  we  may 
avoid  the  issue.  If,  on  the  contrary,  we  are 
brave,  we  shall  go  boldly  up  to  the  thing  in 
our  path,  and  see  whether  it  cannot  be  put 
aside.  In  order  to  get  along  creditably  in 
this  world,  every  one  of  us  must  have  a  good 
supply  of  moral  courage  and  real  force  of 
character.  These  tasks  of  the  schoolroom 
are  chiefly  valuable  because  in  them  there  is 
hidden  the  element  which  turns  the  raw  re- 
cruit into  a  soldier,  the  element  called  drill. 
You  get  an  enormous  amount  of  drill  for 
your  mind  when  you  study  mathematics. 
You  may  not  find  it  agreeable,  but  that  does 
not  matter.  The  fruit  will  be  reaped  later 
on. 

You  need  not  laugh  at  me,  Dorothy,  when 
I  tell  you  that  a  girl  who  has  been  thoroughly 
trained  and  disciplined  by  struggles  with 
mathematics,  that  for  her  hard  conquest,  will 
bear  herself  much  more  finely  than  one  who 
has  spent  her  time  dawdling  over  lessons  that 
never  taxed  Her  powers.  For  instance,  it  is 
a  shame  for  a  woman  to  scream  when  she  sees 
a  poor  little  mouse  scuttling  as  fast  as  it  can 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

out  of  the  closet,  or  to  go  into  fits  when  a  bat 
or  a  spider  or  some  other  uncanny  creature 
crosses  her  field  of  vision.  Women  who  do 
this  are  women  who  have  never  had  any  prac- 
tical drill  in  self-control.  You  may  not  know 
it,  but  there  is  the  greatest  peril  to  women  in 
not  being  able  to  keep  a  good  grip  on  them- 
selves. 

I  once  met  a  lady  approaching  middle  age, 
who  boasted  that  she  had  never  restrained  an 
emotion  in  her  life.  "If  anything  goes 
wrong,  I  just  go  to  pieces,"  she  said,  "  and 
everybody  has  to  fly  around  and  wait  on 
me."  She  seemed  to  think  this  a  meritorious 
thing.  In  reality,  it  was  disgraceful.  The 
one  duty  beyond  all  others  for  you  and  me, 
Dorothy,  is  to  be  equal  to  the  occasion  when- 
ever it  comes,  and  to  rule  our  own  spirit. 
How  are  we  ever  going  to  rule  anybody  else 
if  we  do  not  rule  ourselves? 

Having  said  this,  let  me  add  that  I  look 
upon  mathematics  very  much  as  the  builder 
looks  on  the  foundation  of  the  house.  If 
you  are  planning  to  build  a  beautiful  man- 
sion, with  many  rooms  and  corridors,  with  a 
46 


MATHEMATICS 


tower  on  the  top  and  windows  open  wide  to 
the  sunshine,  you  must  first  of  all  dig  deeply 
into  the  earth  and  see  that  your  underpinning 
will  be  safe  and  your  foundation  stable. 

The  whole  of  education  is  built  on  the 
alphabet,  the  multiplication  table  and  the 
Ten  Commandments.  On  these  you  may 
rear  whatever  beautiful  edifice  you  please. 
It  would  be  a  very  one-sided  development 
that  a  girl  would  have  who  knew  nothing  ex- 
cept mathematics.  Once  in  awhile  this  has 
been  shown  in  the  case  of  some  mathematical 
prodigy  who  has  performed  astonishing  feats 
with  figures  and  has  done  nothing  else.  At 
one  end  of  the  scale  place  mathematics  for 
ballast;  at  the  other  end  give  play  to  imag- 
ination and  then  you  will  have  a  perfectly 
balanced  character.  Do  not  make  the  mis- 
take of  thinking  that  there  is  no  virtue  out- 
side the  ledger.  Every  child  who  solves  a 
difficult  problem  should  be  told  a  fairy  story 
immediately  afterward  as  a  reward.  What- 
ever else  you  omit,  be  sure  you  cultivate  your 
mind  in  the  region  of  poetry  and  fancy. 

A  traveler  was  wending  his  way  over  the 

47 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

mountains  of  Kentucky,  when  he  came  at 
nightfall  to  a  cabin  in  a  lonely  pass.  He 
asked  if  he  might  find  shelter  for  the  night, 
and  the  hospitality  of  the  mountains  was  at 
once  extended  to  him.  Food  and  a  bed  and 
asylum  for  man  and  beast  are  always  freely 
given  by  the  dwellers  in  those  hillside  homes. 
Lying  at  full  length  on  the  cabin  floor  and 
ciphering  by  the  light  of  blazing  pine  knots 
was  a  boy  who  seemed  absorbed  in  his  occu- 
pation. On  inquiry,  it  transpired  that  this 
lad  of  fourteen,  who  had  had  very  little 
schooling,  was  working  his  own  way  through 
algebra,  patiently  tackling  every  difficulty  as 
he  met  it,  and  thus  far  he  had  had  almost  no 
help.  The  traveler  discovered  that  the  boy 
had  a  genuine  love  for  learning;  the  sort  of 
love  that  pushes  a  student  on  whether  he  has 
teachers  or  not.  He  was  able  to  give  him 
some  suggestions,  and  after  awhile  to  put 
him  in  the  way  of  going  to  college.  That 
mountain  boy  became  a  distinguished  profes- 
sor in  a  great  university,  proving  himself  not 
only  skillful  in  mathematics,  but  able  to  mas- 
ter other  studies  in  many  fields. 
48 


MATHEMATICS 


Dorothy,  the  real  value  of  mathematics 
for  you  will  be  to  convince  you  that  whatever 
other  girls  have  done,  a  girl  like  you  may  do. 
Also,  it  may  help  you  to  adopt  the  motto  of 
the  wisest  of  men,  "  Whatsoever  thy  hand 
findeth  to  do,  do  it  with  thy  might." 


CHAPTER  VII 

HOW   TO   WRITE 

day  In  the  early  summer,  it  was 
my  great  fortune  to  be  invited  to  what 
was  called  "  A  Composition  Reading  "  in  a 
girls'  school  of  high  character  and  wide  repu- 
tation. It  was  a  pretty  sight  that  greeted 
my  eyes.  The  girls  of  all  ages,  from  ten 
to  eighteen,  were  dressed  in  white,  and  their 
sweet  faces  and  lovely  manners  entitled  them 
to  be  called,  if  ever  girls  deserved  the  name, 
winsome  schoolgirls. 

The  program  of  the  morning  included 
essays  in  English  composition,  written  by 
members  of  every  class  in  the  school,  from 
the  lowest  to  the  highest.  There  was  great 
variety  both  in  subjects  and  in  treatment. 
Full  play  was  given  to  originality,  and  no 
two  compositions  were  alike.  The  teacher 
who  had  charge  of  the  work  told  me  that  so 

50 


HOW  TO  WRITE 


far  from  disliking  to  write,  the  girls  loved 
the  exercise,  and  that  her  classes  were  the 
most  popular  in  the  curriculum. 

I  don't  know  how  it  may  seem  to  you.  You 
may  enjoy  writing  compositions  or  you  may 
dread  and  dislike  this  part  of  school  duty. 
It  depends  a  good  deal  on  the  way  one  be- 
gins, whether  one  likes  or  dislikes  anything. 
If  one  is  called  upon  to  write  a  composition 
on  a  topic  which  does  not  interest  her,  and 
which  she  knows  absolutely  nothing  about, 
she  cannot  expect  to  find  much  fun  or  much 
interest  in  so  dry  a  task.  The  important 
thing  is  to  have  something  to  say.  Composi- 
tion is  the  art  of  having  something  to  say, 
and  saying  it  agreeably,  with  due  regard  to 
the  rules  of  good  English. 

If  one  wishes  to  excel  in  this  branch  of  ed- 
ucation, one  must  first  of  all  be  willing  to 
take  great  pains.  If  I  were  teaching  a 
group  of  girls,  I  would  say:  Write  your 
theme  at  the  top  of  your  page,  then  stop  and 
ask  yourself  what  you  know  about  it.  If 
you  are  to  write  the  story  of  a  journey,  go 
back  in  memory  to  the  day  you  started,  and 
51 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

tell  in  an  orderly  fashion  the  various  steps 
you  took,  by  what  train  or  boat  you  traveled, 
what  incidents  arrested  your  attention  on  the 
way,  and  how  you  were  impressed  when  you 
arrived  at  your  destination. 

There  are  people  who  go  through  the 
world  as  if  they  had  no  eyes.  They  see  little, 
because  they  do  not  look.  The  one  who 
looks  around  her  will  find  interesting  inci- 
dents in  the  shortest  walk,  or  drive,  or  trip 
by  train.  In  describing  a  place  or  a  jaunt 
there  is  this  to  be  remembered,  that  you  wish 
to  fix  the  emphasis  on  the  strongest  points, 
and  slide  over  without  mention  little  details 
that  are  simply  commonplace.  For  instance, 
it  is  not  necessary  to  say  that  the  conductor 
came  through  the  train  and  took  up  the 
tickets.  As  everybody  knows,  conductors 
always  do  this.  But  if  you  had  an  experi- 
ence that  I  once  had,  on  a  leisurely  train,  in  a 
southern  state,  when  the  conductor  signaled 
the  engineer  while  some  of  the  lady  passen- 
gers went  out  of  the  cars  and  gathered 
flowers  by  the  roadside,  you  might  tell  about 
52 


HOW  TO  WRITE 


it.     In  other  words,  tell  of  the  unusual,  not 
of  the  ordinary. 

If  your  composition  is  to  be  historical,  and 
its  central  figure  is  one  of  the  country's  men 
of  renown,  as,  for  instance,  George  Washing- 
ton, Robert  E.  Lee,  or  some  other  man  whose 
deeds  have  passed  into  history,  you  would 
best  read  what  you  can  find  about  the  man 
and  his  period.  On  no  account  write  your 
composition  with  the  book  you  have  read 
before  you.  As  you  read  make  notes,  if  you 
choose,  so  that  you  may  be  accurate  when 
you  mention  a  place  or  a  date,  but  put  wholly 
aside  before  you  begin  to  write  the  volume 
you  have  been  consulting.  You  wish  to 
write  your  composition  in  your  own  words, 
not  in  the  words  of  an  author  whose  volumes 
are  in  the  library.  Do  not  waste  time  in 
a  long  introduction.  Begin  at  the  beginning, 
tell  where  your  hero  was  born,  where  he  at- 
tended school,  and  what  happened  about  the 
time  that  he  entered  public  life.  This  is  not 
difficult  in  the  case  of  the  Father  of  His 
Country,  and  every  American  girl  should 

53 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

be  so  familiar  with  his  life  that  she  can  write 
a  creditable  composition  on  George  Washing- 
ton. 

Perhaps  your  teacher  will  ask  you  to  make 
an  abstract  of  an  interesting  book  which 
you  have  lately  read.  Here,  again,  ask 
yourself  what  pleased  you  most  in  the  book 
or  the  story,  and  which  of  the  characters  was 
the  most  entertaining?  Try  to  tell  the  story 
briefly,  taking  from  it  the  important  points 
and  omitting  much  of  the  conversation  and 
the  minor  episodes.  One  of  the  most  prom- 
inent American  authors,  a  man  whose  name 
is  famous  wherever  English  is  spoken,  puts 
the  entire  substance  of  a  long  novel  into  three 
pages  of  note  paper,  before  he  begins  to  write 
his  book.  If  an  author  can  do  this  in  com- 
posing the  framework  of  a  novel,  a  school- 
girl writing  about  the  book,  when  she  has 
read  it,  may  learn  how  to  sketch  the  story 
the  same  way.  Doing  this  gives  splendid 
practice  in  writing  English. 

Your  composition  may  take  for  its  subject 
an  act  in  one  of  Shakespeare's  plays,  or  it  may 
weave  itself  around  a  text  of  Scripture,  or  a 
54 


HOW  TO  WRITE 


sentiment  from  poetry.  Whatever  the  sub- 
ject, sit  down  before  it  and  gaze  at  it  until  it 
takes  shape  in  your  mind,  and  your  thoughts 
begin  to  answer  it,  as  the  key  on  the  piano 
responds  to  the  touch  of  your  finger. 

Every  schoolgirl  should  learn  how  to 
write  a  letter.  A  business  letter  should  be 
straightforward  and  lucid,  telling  precisely 
what  one  wants,  in  the  fewest  possible  words. 
A  letter  written  to  the  home  people,  when 
one  is  absent,  should  be  very  much  like  a 
pleasant  bit  of  talk.  It  should  not  take  for 
granted  that  the  absent  know  all  that  is  go- 
ing on;  it  should  tell  them  every  trifle. 
Above  all,  it  should  answer  any  questions 
they  may  have  put  in  letters  they  have  sent. 

In  old  times  there  were  pet  phrases  with 
which  people  began  their  letters,  such  as :  "I 
take  my  pen  in  hand  to  write  a  few  lines,"  or 
"  Having  a  half-hour  to  spare  this  afternoon, 
I  thought  I  could  not  spend  it  better  than  in 
writing  to  you,"  etc.  These  phrases  have 
quite  gone  out,  and  are  not  at  all  necessary. 
Begin  your  letter  as  you  would  your  compo- 
sition, at  the  beginning.  Let  your  letter 

55 


. 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

represent  you.  Use  the  same  words  you 
would  if  you  were  sitting  face  to  face  with 
your  correspondent. 

No  girl  will  ever  excel  in  writing  composi- 
tions who  is  not  fond  of  reading  good  books. 
The  more  one  reads,  the  better  one  will  write. 
As  we  read,  words  and  sentences  form  them- 
selves into  part  of  the  furniture  of  the  mind. 
A  good  style  is  gained,  not  so  much  by  con- 
stant writing,  as  by  thoughtful  reading. 
Read  the  books  you  like.  Read  books  that 
have  to  do  with  what  you  are  studying. 
Read  Tennyson  and  Shakespeare,  and  Long- 
fellow and  Emerson.  Time  spent  over  good 
books  will  be  well  spent  time  for  girls  who 
long  to  write  cleverly  and  forcibly. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

EXAMINATIONS 

TfXAMINATIONS  loom  large  in  school 
"^^  life,  because  they  are  tests  of  progress. 
When  the  school  year  is  at  an  end,  and  you 
look  back  over  its  course,  as  over  a  journey 
from  one  point  to  another,  the  examinations 
stand  out  in  memory  like  milestones  on  the 
road.  In  some  schools  there  are  weekly 
tests,  in  others  reviews  come  monthly,  and 
in  nearly  every  school  there  are  half-yearly 
examinations  which  very  fairly  show  the 
work  that  has  been  assigned  and  demonstrate 
the  faithfulness  with  which  it  has  been  done. 
A  student  whose  work  is  fairly  well  per- 
formed every  day,  who  never  brings  half- 
learned  lessons  to  a  recitation,  who  never 
shirks  a  task  or  accepts  help,  instead  of  work- 
ing out  problems  for  herself,  need  have  no 
dread  of  examinations.  They  will  take  care 

57 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

of  themselves.  But  there  are  girls  who  have 
an  easy  way  of  slipping  through  their  tasks, 
who  are  not  at  all  thorough,  nor  diligent,  and 
yet  who  manage  to  seem  prepared  when  they 
are  just  the  reverse.  I  have  known  such 
girls,  brilliant  and  superficial,  who  glanced 
over  their  work  at  the  last  moment,  and 
hoped  for  an  easy  question,  or  who  looked 
as  if  they  knew  so  much  that  the  teacher 
passed  them  over,  and  put  her  query  to  a 
duller  girl  in  the  next  seat.  These  sketchy 
girls  when  examination  time  comes  are 
obliged  to  "  cram."  They  spend  frantic 
hours  in  making  up  in  a  hurry  what  ought 
to  have  been  at  their  fingers'  ends  throughout 
the  term.  They  possibly  pass  a  written  ex- 
amination, and  send  in  papers  that  receive 
high  marks.  But  in  the  end  they  will  be  dis- 
tanced by  other  girls  who  were  faithful  all 
through. 

Girls  who  are  merely  clever  are  like  mer- 
chants who  put  all  their  goods  in  the  shop 
windows,  and  have  nothing  on  the  shelves. 
Unless  we  have  plenty  to  draw  from  besides 
what  we  put  in  front  for  the  public  to  see, 

58 


EXAMINATIONS 


we  shall  soon  find  our  working  capital  ex- 
hausted, and  our  resources  hopelessly  crip- 
pled. 

I  wonder  if  you  understand  precisely  what 
I  mean?  It  is  so  important  that  a  woman 
should  in  these  days  be  equipped  at  every 
point,  for  her  home  life  or  her  business  op- 
portunities, or  her  profession,  whatever  it 
may  be,  that  no  girl  at  school  can  afford  to 
waste  her  opportunities.  You  have  been 
told  over  and  over  until  the  words  seem  but 
an  idle  tale,  that  you  are  in  life's  morning, 
that  these  are  your  best  days,  and  that  if  you 
do  not  make  the  most  of  the  present,  it  will 
never  be  in  your  power  to  retrieve  the  loss. 

Half  the  time  you  listen  to  this  sort  of 
preaching  with  bored  resignation,  when  it 
comes  from  parents  and  teachers.  But,  dear 
girl,  it  is  true.  The  mill  will  never  grind 
again  with  water  that  is  passed.  What  you 
lose  to-day  you  cannot  gain  to-morrow.  The 
real  value  of  education  to  girls,  is  that  it 
is  preparing  them  to  take  their  places  in  the 
world,  and  to  make  the  world  better  in  days 
to  come.  A  girl  who  does  not  make  the 
59 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

most  of  her  time  in  school  will  not  only  be 
sorry  later  on,  but  will  be  surpassed  by  others 
less  clever  than  herself,  but  more  conscien- 
tious. 

Occasionally  one  meets  a  very  common- 
place woman  who  has  few  ideas,  no  con- 
versation, and  very  little  influence.  People 
pass  her  by  without  paying  attention  to  any- 
thing she  says,  and  express  surprise  when 
told  that  she  is  a  graduate  of  some  conspicu- 
ous college.  How  she  ever  managed  to  se- 
cure a  diploma,  may  be  asked. 

Well,  there  may  be  more  than  one  ex- 
planation. She  may  have  done  her  work 
mechanically,  or  she  may  have  had  a  remark- 
ably good  memory,  or  she  may  have  studied 
hard  for  examinations  and  used  up  her 
strength  too  lavishly.  Unless  one  is  de- 
veloped systematically  in  brain  and  heart  and 
body,  she  will  have  to  take  a  back  seat  in 
the  audience  when  others  are  on  the  plat- 
form, directing  the  purposes  of  the  assembly. 
She  will  be  in  the  rear,  and  the  procession 
will  finally  drop  her  from  its  ranks. 

I  want  to  say  something  to  encourage  the 
60 


EXAMINATIONS 


dull  girls,  who  have  to  work  tremendously 
for  all  they  secure.  In  talking  one  day  with 
a  noted  educator,  a  man  under  whose  eyes 
hundreds  of  pupils  have  passed,  and  who  had 
made  a  profound  study  of  the  possibilities 
of  young  people,  I  was  impressed  with  some- 
thing he  said.  It  was  this :  "  I  am  not  very 
much  interested  in  the  clever  and  brilliant 
girls  who  toss  off  their  work  as  if  it  were  a 
bagatelle.  They  may  be  trusted  to  achieve 
some  good  results,  unless  they  depend  too 
much  on  their  native  quickness,  or  they  prove 
failures.  A  plodding  pupil  who  has  to  wage 
a  battle  for  every  inch  of  ground  gained, 
awakens  my  enthusiasm  and  stimulates  me  to 
offer  all  the  help  that  is  in  me.  I  love  to  see 
the  triumph  of  dogged  perseverance  when 
difficulties  have  thickened  in  the  way." 

Perhaps  the  point  made  here  by  the  teacher 
was  to  the  effect  that  what  we  strive  for  we 
prize,  and  also  that  steady  application,  with 
a  given  object  in  view,  in  the  long  run,  is 
better  than  swift  spurts,  with  lapses  of  idle- 
ness between  them. 

However,  we  are  not  all  alike.  Some  of 
61 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

you  have  one  method,  some  another.  What- 
ever else  you  leave  undone,  I  beg  you  never 
to  let  a  day  end  until  you  have  finished  fully 
the  things  that  belong  to  that  day.  The 
long  vacations  which  we  have  ought  to  be 
put  to  good  use  by  schoolgirls,  partly  in 
view  of  next  year's  work,  and  partly  because 
it  is  absurd  to  drop  study  wholly  for  one- 
fourth  or  one-sixth  of  the  year. 

The  summer  holiday  is  not  in  the  least  too 
long  for  the  teacher,  but  it  is  much  too  long 
an  interval  for  girls  who  wish  to  make  the 
most  of  the  flying  years,  to  spend  in  entire 
idleness.  Why  not  take  two  hours  every 
day  and  devote  them  to  some  earnest  study 
which  will  keep  the  mind  facile,  and  help 
you  along  another  year?  Why  not  get  up 
examination  papers  of  your  own?  If  you 
like  and  if  you  have  no  conditions,  to  occupy 
you  before  you  pass  to  a  higher  grade,  a  good 
plan  may  be  to  take  hold  of  some  study  that 
will  keep  you  much  out  of  doors.  The 
woods  and  fields  are  full  of  flowers.  The 
brook  and  river  wave  with  flags  and  rushes. 
Up  the  hill  slopes  climb  the  wild  roses,  be- 
62 


EXAMINATIONS 


side  the  fence  blaze  the  tiger  lilies,  over  the 
stone  wall  riots  the  vine,  and  every  tree  and 
bush  and  shrub  is  a  whole  school  of  natural 
history.  There  are  birds  almost  without 
number,  there  will  be  moths,  beetles,  butter- 
flies, crickets  and  katydids,  squirrels  will  frisk 
among  the  boughs,  and  chipmunks  play  hide 
and  seek  among  the  leaves.  Do  not  lose 
sight  of  the  interesting  things  that  are  all 
about  you  out  of  doors. 

Whether  you  pass  your  examinations  in 
school  with  credit  or  not,  sit  down  now  at 
Mother  Nature's  feet  and  learn  of  her.  Do 
not  be  discouraged  if  you  have  been  sur- 
passed by  somebody  else.  Do  your  best, 
and  leave  the  rest.  If  at  first  you  don't  suc- 
ceed, try,  try  again. 


CHAPTER  IX 

THE  UNPOPULAR  TEACHER 

*  I  VWO   bright   heads   were   bent   together 
over  the  same  book.     As  they  reached 
the  last  page  Susan  looked  at  Penelope  and 
sighed. 

"  There,"  she  said,  "  that  is  ended.  We 
shall  recite  to-morrow  to  dear  Miss  M.,  and 
then  next  week  will  see  us  in  Miss  B.'s  class- 
room, and  good-by  to  good  times  for  six 
months.  Every  girl  who  has  ever  been  with 
Miss  B.  fairly  hates  her,  unless  she  happens 
to  be  one  of  her  pets.  She  has  pets  and 
they  may  do  anything,  but  the  rest  of  the 
class  are  always  getting  demerits  and  being 
scolded  and  made  to  do  extra  work.  I  wish 
I  could  be  Rip  Van  Winkle  and  sleep  straight 
through  the  next  grade.  Miss  W.,  who  has 
the  class  higher  than  Miss  B.,  is  a  darling. 
But  one  can't  reach  her  without  having  to 
64 


THE  UNPOPULAR  TEACHER 

undergo  the  misery  of  the  class  below." 
"  Aren't  you  exaggerating?  "  asked  Penel- 
ope. "  I  have  seen  Miss  B.  a  number  of 
times,  and  she  looks  harmless.  I  cannot  un- 
derstand why  she  is  so  unpopular.  The 
teachers  appear  to  find  her  pleasant." 

"  Oh,  she  is  pleasant  enough  with  them 
and  with  visiting  parents,"  exclaimed  Sue. 
"  It  is  only  her  own  girls  to  whom  she  is  a 
tyrant.  You  have  not  lived  here  very  long, 
but  I  have  gone  through  this  school,  from 
the  kindergarten  up,  and  so  have  my  sisters. 
Lucy  and  Mildred  and  their  friends  have 
the  same  opinion  that  I  have.  Everybody 
dreads  Miss  B." 

Penelope's  dark  eyes  grew  thoughtful. 
"  Well,  Sue,"  she  said,  "  my  father  has  al- 
ways taught  me  to  value  fair  play,  and  it 
does  not  look  to  me  like  fair  play  to  begin 
in  a  new  class  with  one's  mind  made  up  that 
she  is  going  to  dislike  the  teacher.  That 
creates  a  false  situation  at  the  outset.  Why 
should  we  blindly  accept  what  other  people 
say  without  waiting  to  see  for  ourselves 
where  the  truth  of  the  matter  lies?  Poor 

65 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

Miss  B.  has  a  hard  road  to  travel,  if  the  girls 
do  not  trust  her  before  they  have  given  her 
the  slightest  trial.  I,  for  one,  shall  do  my 
work  in  the  best  way  I  can,  and  I  shall  try 
to  love  Miss  B.  and  to  make  her  love  me." 

Susan  gave  her  head  a  toss.  "  I  predict, 
Penelope,  that  you  will  be  a  favorite,"  she 
said,  scornfully. 

"  Not  at  all,  but  I  have  a  conscience,  and 
I  am  going  to  give  my  teacher  the  benefit  of 
a  chance.  I  wish  you  wyould  join  me.  Per- 
haps if  you  and  I  take  the  lead,  some  of  the 
others  will  follow,  and  Miss  B.  for  once  may 
have  the  pleasure  of  teaching  a  class  of  girls 
who  are  not  determined  to  misunderstand  her 
intentions  and  who  are  not  doing  what  they 
can  to  make  her  work  hard.  I  believe  in 
making  my  teacher's  task  easy,  if  I  can. 
Mother  was  a  teacher  before  her  marriage, 
and  she  has  told  me  a  good  deal  about  the 
trials  of  a  teacher's  life." 

Penelope  had  in  her  girlish  wisdom  caught 

the  thread  of  a  clew  that  had  tangled  itself 

and  led  far  back  into  the  years  during  which 

the    unpopular    teacher    had    occupied    her 

66 


THE  UNPOPULAR  TEACHER 

chair.  Miss  B.  was  exceptionally  well 
equipped,  a  student  painstaking  and  pro- 
found, the  graduate  of  one  college  and  the 
successful  prize-winner  in  post-graduate  work 
in  another,  but  she  lacked  the  magnetism 
which  in  itself  makes  some  women  adorable 
and  adored.  In  truth,  she  was  more  and 
more  afraid  of  the  girls  she  taught;  her 
native  diffidence  and  shyness  made  her  seem 
stiff  and  stern;  she  encrusted  herself  as  diffi- 
dent people  often  do  in  a  chain-armor  of  re- 
serve. She  recoiled  from  the  unspoken 
criticism  of  the  girls  who  sat  before  her,  and 
though  she  honestly  tried  she  was  seldom 
able  to  make  them  feel  that  she  cared  for 
them  personally.  They  supposed  that  in 
her  view  they  were  so  many  pegs  in  a  row 
or  pawns  on  a  chessboard,  and  they  resented 
the  impersonality  of  her  near-sighted  gaze. 
Girls  are  sometimes  very  heartless,  and  in- 
stead of  feeling  pitiful  when  occasionally 
they  saw  a  quiver  of  pain  cross  Miss  B.'s 
countenance,  such  a  token  of  sensitiveness  on 
her  part  only  made  them  dislike  her  the 
more.  In  her  endeavor  to  be  just  and  to 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

exact  the  best  work  of  which  the  class  was 
capable,  she  often  went  too  far  and  marked 
too  severely  any  failure.  If  right  relations 
are  not  existent  between  teacher  and  schol- 
ars it  is  very  difficult  for  either  to  accomplish 
much. 

If  a  teacher  in  the  depths  of  her  own  soul 
is  aware  that  she  is  no  disciplinarian,  she 
probably  makes  efforts  in  the  direction  where 
she  is  weak,  and  the  result  is  a  continual  con- 
flict between  her  class  and  herself.  The  re- 
sistance may  not  be  open,  but  it  is  always 
ready  to  break  out  like  a  smouldering  fire. 
Nothing  on  earth  is  harder  to  vanquish  than 
a  prejudice,  and  the  less  reasonable  it  be  the 
more  stubborn  it  probably  is  in  maintaining 
its  ground. 

I  wish  I  could  persuade  girls  to  imitate 
Penelope  and  be  fair  to  the  unpopular 
teacher  in  whose  interest  I  am  holding  a 
brief.  She  may  not  be  happy  and  at  ease  in 
her  home  life.  In  the  background  there 
may  be  an  ailing  father  or  mother  whose  wel- 
fare is  a  matter  of  deep  anxiety  to  her,  and 
whose  care  robs  her  of  sleep.  For  instance, 
68 


THE  UNPOPULAR  TEACHER 

I  know  a  teacher  rather  unpopular  in  the 
class  room,  who  for  several  years  lost  half 
of  her  night's  rest  in  sitting  up  with  and 
ministering  to  an  invalid  sister.  There  was 
no  one  else  to  take  her  place,  and  in  conse- 
quence she  brought  with  her  to  school  an 
atmosphere  of  fatigue  which  made  itself  felt 
without  her  knowledge.  Irritability  is  often 
born  of  weariness. 

Girls  generally  worship  teachers  because 
of  little  externals  that  have  not  very  much 
to  do  with  the  teacher's  efficiency.  A  teacher 
who  has  lovely  eyes  and  beautiful  hair,  and 
the  suspicion  of  a  dimple  when  she  smiles,  or 
who  wears  pretty  things  and  is  very  at- 
tractive as  to  waists  and  stocks,  has  a  great 
advantage  over  her  plainer  associate,  who 
is  indifferent  to  dress. 

On  the  whole,  I  sympathize  with  girls  in 
admiring  the  teacher  who  is  invariably  im- 
maculate and  tidy,  and  who  has  about  her 
the  bright  attractiveness  of  perfect  health 
and  the  beauty  that  is  typical  of  womanly 
goodness.  It  is  our  duty  whether  we  are 
girls  in  our  teens  or  women  beyond  them 
69 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

always  to  look  as  charming  and  to  behave  as 
amiable  as  we  can. 

But  I  put  it  to  every  one  of  you.  Is  it 
fair  to  start  new  work  with  a  new  teacher 
without  being  at  least  willing  to  give  her 
your  confidence?  Or  if  you  are  already  in 
a  class  and  do  not  like  your  teacher,  is  it 
never  worth  while  to  be  honest  and  candid 
and  inquire  if  you  are  not  just  a  little  bit  to 
blame  for  the  state  of  things  yourselves? 
In  this  world  a  lot  of  trouble  springs  from 
misunderstandings  that  might  as  well  never 
come  to  the  front,  and  people  who  should 
be  good  friends  stand  aloof  and  never  get 
acquainted  because  they  let  a  trifling  and  non- 
essential  thing  keep  them  apart. 

A  very  thoughtful  writer  has  said  that  in 
every  human  soul  there  is  an  innermost  room, 
and  that  if  we  could  discover  it  we  should 
learn  secrets  that  we  never  find  out  when  we 
are  only  in  the  outer  courts.  This  may  be 
too  philosophical  for  you,  dear  girls,  but  I 
want  you  to  believe  that  there  is  something 
very  sweet  about  the  most  unpopular  teacher 
70 


THE  UNPOPULAR  TEACHER 

you  have  ever  had,  if  you  will  take  pains  to 
search  for  it. 

"  There  's  so  much  good  in  the  worst  of  us, 
And  so  much  bad  in  the  best  of  us, 
That  it  ill  behooves  any  of  us 
To  talk  about  the  rest  of  us." 


CHAPTER  X 

THE  CARE  OF  SCHOOLBOOKS 

T  AM  about  to  confess  to  you  a  little  w 
ness  of  mine.  I  cannot  endure  a  t 
that  is  covered  either  with  a  loose  paper 
tection,  or  a  tightly  fitting  extra  garb  of 
fabric  whatever.  When  a  new  book  cc 
into  my  hands  the  first  thing  I  do,  unle 
expect  to  lend  it,  is  to  throw  away  the  pi 
outside  covering,  which  in  these  days 
lishers  put  on  new  books  to  keep  them  cl 
If  I  think  that  I  shall  have  occasion  to 
the  book  after  awhile  to  a  friend,  or  to  a 
neighbor,  or  perhaps  to  one  of  you,  to  wl 
I  am  writing,  I  take  pains  to  preserve 
portable  cover,  and  I  slip  it  on  before  the  t 
leaves  my  possession. 

I  hope  you  love  your  books  as   I 
mine,   and  care   for  them   as   I   do.     I 
joy  the  beauty  of  fair  type,  fine  paper, 
72 


CARE  OF  SCHOOLBOOKS 

choice  illustrations,  and  I  have  a  great  regard 
for  a  beautiful  binding.  I  never  hold  a 
book  in  hands  that  are  soiled,  or  leave  it  face 
downward  and  open  on  a  chair  or  table,  or 
hand  it  over  to  a  child  that  it  may  keep  the 
child  quiet. 

I  have  lent  books  before  now  to  very  dear 
friends,  and  have  had  them  returned  in  such 
a  condition  of  loosened  leaves,  spotted  pages, 
stained  bindings  and  degenerate  condition 
generally,  that  I  have  at  once  thrown  them 
into  the  fire  and  bought  others.  One  may 
really  wish  to  share  the  pleasure  a  book  gives 
her  with  some  one  she  is  fond  of,  and  still 
may  hesitate  if  she  is  aware  that  her  friend 
has  never  learned  to  treat  a  book  with  re- 
spect for  its  worth,  and  regard  for  its  cost. 

Take  your  schoolbooks,  for  instance. 
They  are  really  charming  books.  From  the 
mechanical  point  of  view  a  good  many  peo- 
ple have  invested  time,  thought,  learning  and 
skill,  in  their  making.  In  the  first  place  the 
author  spent  laborious  months  and  years  in 
mastering  the  subject  of  the  school  text- 
books, and  he  toiled  over  it  that  he  might 
73 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

condense  a  great  deal  of  information  into 
concrete  and  compact  statement,  making  it 
so  simple,  so  lucid  and  so  clear,  that  the  be- 
ginner in  science  or  literature  could  compre- 
hend it  in  a  daily  task. 

You  may  fancy  that  it  is  easy  to  write 
definitions  and  formulas  and  rules.  But  in 
reality,  nothing  in  literature  is  so  hard. 
More  brains  and  more  conscience  and  more 
labor  go  into  the  production  of  a  standard 
schoolbook  than  into  the  writing  of  an  epic 
poem  or  a  three-volumed  novel. 

I  saw  Rosamond  in  a  fit  of  vexation  toss 
her  arithmetic  across  the  room,  to  the  detri- 
ment of  the  poor  book,  and  I  felt  a  queer 
little  throb  of  pity  for  the  man  who  had 
made  that  arithmetic.  A  set  of  reading 
books  into  which  have  gone  specimens  of  the 
best  English  literature,  culled  from  many 
fields,  is  a  treasure  well  worth  a  schoolgirl's 
nicest  care. 

Cover  your  book,  if  you  like,  if  it  is  the 

custom  of  your  school  and  the  teachers  insist 

on  your  doing  so,  but  use  the  books  so  well 

that  if  they   are  not  covered  they  may  be 

74 


CARE  OF  SCHOOLBOOKS 

passed  on  to  other  classes  or  to  younger  chil- 
dren, without  having  suffered  harm. 

Besides  the  authors  who  are  the  creators, 
so  to  speak,  of  our  books,  there  are  the  pub- 
lishers and  the  printers  and  the  paper-makers 
and  the  artists  and  the  people  who  finally  sell 
the  books,  all  of  whom  have  their  separate 
fingers  in  the  pie,  before  it  is  ready  to  slip 
into  your  hands. 

When  a  book  is  your  own,  where  do  you 
keep  it?  I  hope  if  you  have  your  own  room 
that  one  portion  of  its  furnishings  includes 
a  bookshelf.  When  you  have  done  with  a 
book,  put  it  in  its  place.  There  are  girls 
who  never  have  a  place  for  anything;  one 
of  them  once  paid  me  a  visit,  and  from  the 
moment  she  crossed  my  threshold  until  the 
day  she  kissed  me  good-by  and  went  merrily 
away,  chaos  followed  in  her  track.  She  left 
her  things  all  over  the  house,  and  kept  her 
room  looking  as  if  it  had  been  swept  by  a 
cyclone,  and  as  for  books,  she  had  not  the 
faintest  notion  of  their  dignity.  I  finally 
took  the  precaution  of  hiding  away  one  or 
two  of  these  that  I  most  prized,  lest  Estelle 
75 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

should  ruin  them  altogether  before  she  de- 
parted. I  do  hope  that  you  have  been  bet- 
ter started  on  the  road  than  had  been  the 
fortune  of  this  poor  child,  who  was  a  dear 
notwithstanding  her  heedless  ways. 

Few  girls  stop  to  think  that  they  have  a 
gold  mine  in  their  school  text-books.  They 
know  that  they  must  devote  time  and  atten- 
tion to  them,  and  that  they  are  the  stepping 
stones  to  culture.  A  girl  would  be  very 
stupid  who  did  not  appreciate  this.  Beyond 
this,  too,  schoolbooks  possess  something  of 
the  value  that  other  reference  books  do  in  a 
library.  After  you  have  left  school  you 
may  some  day  be  in  company  with  a  traveler 
or  an  explorer  who  has  seen  strange  things 
in  the  heart  of  Africa  or  has  ventured  into 
distant  regions  in  another  zone.  You  can 
converse  with  him  more  intelligently  and  get 
more  profit  from  his  fascinating  talk  than 
would  otherwise  be  possible,  if  you  have  at 
your  hand  a  school  geography  and  an  atlas. 
You  may  be  reading  the  daily  paper,  and 
there  you  may  find  that  war  is  threatened 
with  a  foreign  country.  You  will  turn  to 

76 


CARE  OF  SCHOOLBOOKS 

your  school  history  and  learn  in  a  few  mo- 
ments something  about  that  country,  and  its 
relations  with  the  rest  of  the  globe.  You 
will  go  back  to  the  newspaper  with  far  greater 
zest.  The  advantage  of  the  schoolbook 
over  other  books  is  that  as  I  have  already 
said,  it  is  condensed  and  clear  and  it  omits 
superfluous  comment  on  the  part  of  its  au- 
thor and  confines  itself  to  actual  facts. 

Of  course  you  are  interested  in  the  study 
of  nature.  You  have  the  latest  botany  and 
the  latest  zoology  among  your  books.  You 
will  find  them  helpful  after  awhile  as  side- 
lights on  a  large  and  delightful  class  of 
books,  that  will  tempt  you  in  spring  and 
summer  excursions  out  of  doors,  either  to 
the  zoological  gardens  to  inspect  strange 
animals  and  reptiles,  or  to  the  wide  fields  to 
gather  flowers  and  woo  from  Nature  herself 
the  story  of  her  exquisite  secrets. 

Be  careful  of  your  books.  To  take  ad- 
mirable care  of  books,  so  far  as  the  outside 
is  concerned,  is  the  hall-mark  of  a  lady.  To 
know  a  good  deal  about  the  inside  of  books, 
to  reverence  them  as  they  deserve,  and  to 

77 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

prize  them  as  the  finest  treasures  money  can 
buy,  are  also  hall-marks  of  those  who  belong 
to  the  best  classes  in  civilization. 


CHAPTER  XI 
THE  SCHOOLGIRL'S  LUNCHEON 

T  IFE  is  about  equally  composed  of  poetry 
and  prose,  when  one  is  anywhere  from 
thirteen  to  eighteen.  The  prose  is  the 
foundation,  and  the  poetry  is  the  top-dress- 
ing. No  matter  how  fond  a  girl  may  be  of 
fairy  stories  and  romance,  she  must  have  her 
three  meals  a  day,  and  bring  a  good  appetite 
to  every  one  of  them,  or  —  she  will  presently 
pine  away  and  turn  into  a  vanishing  heroine 
in  her  own  person. 

I  am  writing  for  healthy,  happy  girls,  who 
have  bright  eyes  and  a  good  color,  who  play 
basket-ball  and  tennis,  and  who  have  well- 
developed  muscles,  as  well  as  clever  brains. 

Don't  fancy  for  a  single  moment,  dear 
girl,  that  you  can  cultivate  the  mind  at  the 
expense  of  the  body,  or  the  body  at  the  ex- 
pense of  the  mind,  without  committing  an 

79 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

act  of  folly.  Girls  who  blunder  in  that  way, 
while  they  are  at  school,  are  sorry  in  years 
to  come.  Your  chief  duty  just  now  is  to 
store  up  a  good  stock  of  health  for  future 
days,  and  if  you  are  not  wholesomely  hungry 
at  proper  times  and  seasons,  something  is 
very  wrong  in  the  conduct  of  your  life. 
*f  Fatal  to  good  appetite  and  good  digestion, 
sure  to  invite  dyspepsia,  is  the  schoolgirl 
habit  of  nibbling  biscuits  and  cakes,  of  munch- 
ing nuts  and  maple  sugar,  and  of  stuffing 
with  sweets  and  candies.  The  caramels, 
the  fudge,  the  chocolates,  the  marshmal- 
lows,  the  other  bonbons,  which  look  so 
inviting,  and  which  while  away  so  many  dol- 
lars from  the  schoolgirl's  little  purse,  in  the 
common  course  of  a  twelvemonth,  undermine 
her  relish  for  good  roast  beef  and  vegetables, 
and  hinder  her  from  eating  food  that  fur- 
nishes healthful  blood  to  the  system.  Can- 
dies and  sweets  should  be  used  as  dessert, 
and,  if  pure,  will  do  no  harm,  although  eaten 
freely.  Nature's  craving  for  sugar  cannot 
be  denied  to  advantage.  But  let  sugar  and 
80 


THE  LUNCHEON 


spice  and  all  that  is  nice,  come  after,  not  be- 
fore, a  solid  meal. 

Breakfast,  for  a  schoolgirl,  should  con- 
sist of  fruit,  cereal,  toast  or  bread,  and  eggs 
or  beefsteak,  if  she  like  either  in  the  morn- 
ing. Milk  is  her  preferable  drink.  Coffee 
and  tea  are  not  for  girls  in  their  teens. 
Plenty  of  cold  water  at  meals  and  between 
them  is  hygienic. 

Some  girls  are  so  fortunate  that  they  can 
go  home  at  noon,  thus  securing  a  walk  in  the 
fresh  air,  and  a  warm  repast  at  the  mother's 
own  table.  This  is  ideal. 

Perhaps  the  next  best  arrangement  is  made 
when  places  are  secured  for  girls  at  a  board- 
ing-house table  near  their  school.  If  the 
school  has  a  luncheon-counter,  and  girls 
patronize  it,  they  may  have  a  choice  of 
wholesome,  well-prepared  food,  including  a 
hot  soup,  which  is  very  desirable.  But  many 
girls  find  the  better  plan  to  be  that  of  a  dainty 
luncheon  brought  from  home. 

Mother  or  sister  should,  if  possible,  pack 
the  pretty  box  or  basket  in  which  Dorothy 
81 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

carries  her  luncheon.  Then  Dorothy  may 
be  surprised  when  she  opens  it. 

Sandwiches,  delicately  thin,  with  every 
particle  of  crust  trimmed  away,  made  of 
brown  bread  or  white  bread,  or  both,  but- 
tered and  pressed  together,  are  very  good. 
They  may  have  as  a  filling,  cream  cheese,  or 
minced  chicken,  or  potted  ham,  or  peanut 
paste,  or  sardines,  or  lettuce,  or  jam  or  jelly. 
Different  kinds  for  different  days  is  my  rule. 
Wrap  them  closely  in  waxed  paper.  Olives, 
a  pickle,  a  new-boiled  egg,  a  wedge  of  cake, 
carefully  wrapped,  a  bit  of  gingerbread,  a 
pear,  a  peach,  a  custard  browned  nicely  in  its 
cup,  finish  an  attractive  luncheon. 

Nothing  coarse,  or  messy,  or  sticky,  should 
be  so  much  as  tolerated  in  a  luncheon  which 
a  girl  is  to  eat,  after  a  morning's  tussle  with 
algebra,  physics  and  English  grammar. 

When  our  Dorothy  becomes  indifferent  to 
her  luncheon,  it  is  time  to  ask  the  doctor  if 
we  wouldn't  do  well  to  take  her  out  of  school. 
For  a  schoolgirl  ought  to  care  about  what 
she  eats.  She  ought  to  be  hungry.  She  is 
82 


THE  LUNCHEON 


growing,  and  growing  creatures  require  to 
be  fed  and  nourished. 

At  our  foremost  women's  colleges  abund- 
ant and  excellent  provision  is  made  in  the 
way  of  food.  A  large  basket  of  thin  crack- 
ers, and  a  great  pitcher  of  milk,  in  some  re- 
fectories, is  always  set  out  for  the  girl  who 
may  happen  to  feel  faint  about  eleven  o'clock. 
A  girl  whose  breakfast  appetite  is  slender 
and  uncertain  may  be  aware  of  a  vacuum 
about  that  hour,  and  she  does  better  work 
after  recess,  if  she  has  had  a  glass  of  milk 
and  a  biscuit. 

A  girl,  if  she  live,  will  have  plenty  of  time 
to  finish  her  school  education.  But  she  has 
only  the  fast-flying  teens  in  which  to  build 
herself  up  to  rich  and  wholesome  and  beau- 
tiful womanhood.  It  does  not  matter  so 
much  whether  she  shall  be  graduated  from 
the  high  school  in  February,  or  in  June  of 
this,  or  of  any  other  year,  but  it  does  matter 
that  she  shall  have  vigor  and  good  spirits 
and  poise  and  gladness,  and  few  aches  or 
pains  in  the  years  of  a  long  life. 

83 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

Poetry  and  prose  go  hand  in  hand  in  a 
girl's  days;  the  poetry  of  her  father's  praises 
and  her  mother's  kisses,  of  good  times  with 
her  friends,  of  happy  day-dreams.  The 
prose  of  three  meals  a  day,  of  long,  restful 
sleep  at  night,  or  long  walks  in  crisp  weather, 
of  vigorous,  athletic  health,  must  underlie 
the  poetry. 

Once,  long  ago,  the  ideal  girl  was  fragile, 
and  pallid,  and  had  swoons  and  headaches. 
It  is  wicked  that  a  girl  should  have  head- 
aches. She  has  no  business  with  them,  nor 
with  "  malaise  "  of  any  sort.  She  should 
be  well;  not  half-ill;  and  if  she  and  her  teach- 
ers and  her  mother  all  pull  together,  she  will 
be  well,  assuredly. 

An  ill-ventilated  schoolroom  may  destroy 
a  girl's  appetite  for  her  luncheon.  In  all 
weathers  a  run  outdoors  is  a  good  prelim- 
inary to  luncheon.  Try  it,  if  you  are  in- 
clined to  fasting  when  you  should  be  feasting. 


84 


CHAPTER  XII 


pENELOPE  came  in  with  a  frown  on  her 
brow.  Her  pretty  face  was  puckered. 
Her  mouth  drooped  at  the  corners,  and  she 
had  almost  the  effect  of  being  in  a  very  bad 
temper.  Penelope  is  one  of  my  greatest 
favorites,  and  I  was  sorry  to  see  that  with 
her  the  wind  was  in  the  east.  "  What  on 
earth  has  gone  wrong,  my  dear?"  I  said, 
anxiously.  '  With  whom  are  you  vexed,  and 
why  are  you  out  of  sorts?  Have  you  lost 
your  purse,  or  your  place  in  the  class,  or 
fallen  out  with  your  chum,  or  are  you  con- 
vinced that  you  never  will  conquer  irregular 
verbs,  or  what  is  the  matter?  " 

"  The    matter,"    said    Penelope,    "  is   my 

monthly    report.     I    am    awfully    disturbed 

about  it,  and  ashamed  to  show  it  at  home, 

and  I  am  angry  at  Miss  — ,  who  might  have 

85 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

made  it  a  great  deal  better  if  only  she  had 
chosen,  but  I  am  not  one  of  her  pets.  I  have 
had  good  marks  in  French  and  in  astronomy, 
in  algebra  and  geometry,  some  days,  any- 
way, if  not  every  day,  and  here  I  am  marked 
B  and  C  and  C  minus,  and  I  have  not  a 
single  A  in  the  whole  month.  My  teacher 
handed  me  this  very  reprovingly,  and  said 
that  such  a  report  was  as  great  a  mortifica- 
tion to  her  as  it  could  possibly  be  to  me,  and 
she  trusted  I  would  do  better  another  month, 
and  not  have  to  take  such  a  record  home 
again. 

"  '  Possibly,  Penelope,'  she  said,  '  you  are 
graded  too  high  and  would  better  drop  some 
of  your  work  and  fall  back  into  a  lower 
class.'  Do  you  wonder,"  stormed  Penelope, 
"that  I  am  furious?  Who  wouldn't  be?" 

"  I  hardly  see,  dear  child,"  I  answered, 
"  why  you  should  be  furious,  as  you  call  it, 
although  I  think  your  unfortunate  teacher 
has  every  right  to  be  indignant.  What  is 
the  reason  that  you  have  done  so  badly? 
The  work  is  not  too  much  for  you,  your 
health  is  perfect,  and  you  ought  to  be  at  the 
86 


GETTING  STARTED 


head  of  your  class,  bringing  home  reports 
sprinkled  all  over  with  A's,  like  stars  in  the 
sky  or  daisies  in  a  meadow  in  June.  You 
must  be  shockingly  careless,  or  you  would  get 
on  in  school  as  well  as  anyone  else.  Where 
is  the  loose  plank?  Something  is  wrong  in 
your  way  of  working.  If  we  could  find  out 
just  what  it  is  and  where  it  is  we  might  mend 
it.  Don't  you  think  so?  " 

'  You  are  very  cross,"  said  Penelope, 
"  and  not  a  single  bit  sympathetic,  and  I  wish 
I  hadn't  come.  But  maybe  I  might  get  on, 
as  you  call  it,  a  little  better  if  it  wasn't  such 
hard  work  to  start  in  the  morning.  I  am 
so  sleepy  that  I  cannot  wake  up  when  I  am 
called;  then  I  have  to  scramble  through 
dressing  and  breakfast  and  fairly  fly  to 
reach  school  in  time.  Very  often  when  there 
I  find  that  I  have  forgotten  a  book  that  I 
need,  or  my  pads  and  pencils,  and  I  am  so 
upset  that  it  takes  me  almost  an  hour  to  feel 
quiet  and  composed.  My  day  somehow 
runs  off  the  track  every  morning  and  does 
not  get  back  until  the  afternoon." 

By  this  time   Penelope's   scowl  had  van- 
8? 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

ished  and  she  dimpled  and  blushed  and  finally 
laughed,,  like  the  sweet,  good-tempered  girl 
she  is. 

1  You  dear,"  I  said.  "  You  have  put 
your  finger  right  on  the  weak  spot.  Your 
whole  trouble  comes  from  not  beginning  the 
day  aright." 

So  many  schoolgirls  have  exactly  the  same 
trouble  that  I  wonder  very  much  why  it  is 
that  their  mothers  and  teachers  do  not  help 
them  out  of  it,  and  that  their  own  good  sense 
does  not  come  to  the  rescue. 

The  truth  is  that  a  successful  day  for  a 
schoolgirl  begins  at  nine  o'clock  the  night  be- 
fore. At  that  hour  she  should  say  good 
night  to  everybody  and  go  to  bed.  If  she 
has  had  dinner  early  and  feels  a  bit  hungry, 
it  will  do  her  no  harm  to  take  a  very  simple 
luncheon  of  bread  and  milk  before  she  goes 
to  her  room.  Then  without  undue  delay, 
she  should  go  to  bed  and  to  sleep.  It  is 
the  wretched  habit  of  sitting  up  until  half- 
past  ten  or  eleven  in  a  warm  room,  with  the 
family  talking,  singing,  playing  games  or  the 
88 


GETTING  STARTED 


piano,  or  perhaps  studying  too  late,  that 
makes  girls  drowsy  in  the  morning. 

Sleeping  in  an  ill-ventilated  room  helps 
along.  '  Be  very  sure  that  you  have  fresh  air 
to  breathe  while  you  are  asleep,  and  protect 
yourself  against  cold  if  necessary,  by  wear- 
ing a  garment  of  outing  flannel  or  of  some 
woolen  stuff  instead  of  too  thin  a  night  dress. 
If  a  girl  goes  early  to  bed  and  sleeps  soundly 
all  night,  she  will  be  able  to  rise  as  soon  as 
she  is  called.  Haste  in  the  morning  upsets 
one  terribly,  and  literally  pursues  one  like  a 
fiend  all  the  rest  of  the  day. 

Rise  in  time  to  take  a  sponge  bath  from 
head  to  foot,  to  arrange  your  hair,  and  to 
have  a  few  tranquil  moments  for  devotion. 
Eat  your  breakfast  slowly,  gather  your  books 
and  papers  with  deliberation  and  set  off  to 
school  with  a  light  heart.  Hurry  and  worry 
devour  one's  ease  of  mind  and  make  it  im- 
possible for  one  to  do  justice  to  her  own 
powers. 

I  think  I  can  tell  in  looking  around  any 
group  of  girls  which  of  them  are  in  the  habit 
89 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

of  beginning  the  day  in  this  leisurely  and  sen- 
sible manner,  and  which  tumble  out  of  bed 
and  into  their  clothes  and  lose  their  wits  and 
their  tempers  before  they  have  attacked  the 
day's  business. 

An  ancient  philosopher  once  said  that 
there  was  everything  in  keeping  an  even 
mind.  Those  of  us  who  have  a  good  deal  to 
do  in  the  course  of  a  day  or  a  week,  are  well 
aware  that  we  accomplish  nothing  if  we 
lose  our  heads  and  rush  where  we  should 
instead  go  slowly. 

So  great  a  thinker  as  Francis  Bacon,  who 
was  a  very  learned  man,  said  in  an  essay  on 
dispatch  that  "  above  all  things  order  and 
distribution  and  singling  out  of  parts  is  the 
life  of  dispatch.  For  he  that  doth  not  di- 
vide will  never  enter  well  into  business.  To 
choose  time  is  to  save  time,  and  an  unseason- 
able motion  is  but  beating  the  air.  I  knew  a 
wise  man  that  had  it  for  a  by-word  when  he 
saw  men  hastening  to  a  conclusion,  stay  a 
little  that  we  may  make  an  end  the  sooner." 

If  so  great  a  man  as  Sir  Francis  Bacon 
thought  it  well  to  act  with  deliberation  and 
90 


GETTING  STARTED 


map  out  his  days  with  forethought,  do  you 
not  think  that  schoolgirls  like  Penelope  and 
her  friends  may  as  well  do  the  same? 

There  is  great  comfort  in  doing  our  best 
and  leaving  the  rest.  As  Longfellow  says, 
pithily : 

"  Trust  no  future,  howe'er  pleasant, 
Let  the  dead  past  bury  its  dead ; 

Act,  act  in  the  living  present, 

Heart  within  and  God  o'erhead." 


CHAPTER  XIII 

HOME   DUTIES 

A     GOOD  deal  of  selfishness,  I  am  sorry 

to  say,   is  shown  by  girls  who  seem 

to  think  that  going  to  school  excuses  them 

from  helping  their  mothers  or  in  any  way 

lending  a  hand  at  home. 

I  quite  understand  that  school  life  makes 
a  great  many  demands  and  that  a  girl,  in 
order  to  keep  up  with  her  class  and  maintain 
a  high  average,  cannot  afford  very  much 
time  for  social  affairs,  as  her  studies  must 
always  come  first.  Nevertheless,  if  a  girl's 
mother  needs  help  with  the  younger  children 
or  with  the  housework,  the  good  daughter 
will  not  refrain  from  giving  it  and  will  do  so 
not  in  the  spirit  of  a  martyr  nor  grudgingly, 
but  with  a  cheery  brightness  and  a  good  will 
that  will  make  her  the  home  sunbeam. 

Lest  some  dear  girl  may  fancy  that  she 
92 


HOME  DUTIES 


cannot  wash  dishes  and  make  beds  and  oc- 
casionally stir  up  a  pudding  and  fill  lamps 
and  dust  living  rooms,  and  still  do  her  class- 
work  creditably,  let  me  tell  two  little  true 
stories. 

One  is  that  of  a  girl  who,  when  a  mere 
little  maid  of  seven  was  left  an  orphan.  Her 
home  was  in  a  New  England  village,  well 
up  toward  the  Canada  line.  Father  and 
mother  were  dead.  She  had  neither  broth- 
ers nor  sisters,  and  with  dismay  she  heard 
the  relative  with  whom  she  lived  talking 
about  the  necessity  of  placing  her  in  an 
asylum.  Without  a  word  to  anyone,  the 
child  walked  to  the  largest  mansion  in  the 
place,  knocked  at  the  door  and  asked  the  lady 
of  the  house  if  she  might  not  come  and  stay 
with  her  and  work  out  of  school  hours. 
The  lady  looked  in  amazement  at  the  enter- 
prising little  applicant  and  said,  doubtfully, 
"What  can  you  do?"  The  child  replied, 
without  hesitation,  "  I  can  do  anything  that 
I  am  told  and  that  I  can  reach."  She  held 
her  little  head  up  with  confidence  and  hope. 

The  lady  could  not  say  no  to  the  little 

93 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

pleader.  She  was  taken  into  the  home  and 
sent  to  school.  She  worked  her  way  into  the 
affections  of  the  household  by  her  quickness 
and  affectionate  docility;  she  went  steadily 
on  through  primary,  grammar  and  high 
school,  and  finally  paid  her  way  by  her  own 
work  through  one  of  the  finest  of  our  east- 
ern colleges  for  women.  That  little  girl  is 
to-day  a  successful  teacher,  and  a  woman  of 
far-reaching  influence. 

Another  girl  whom  I  know  well  is  a  stu- 
dent in  a  college  where  the  standard  is  ex- 
ceptionally high  and  she,  having  won  a  schol- 
arship by  brilliant  attainments,  is  paying  for 
her  board  in  a  home  near  the  college  by  the 
work  she  does  in  the  mornings  and  evenings. 

Mothers  are  often  very  ready  to  save  their 
daughters  trouble.  No  matter  how  tired  the 
mother  may  be,  she  says  nothing  about  it. 
Her  deft  hands  make  the  dainty  frocks  her 
daughters  wear,  her  willing  hands  often  iron 
the  shirt  waists  and  the  stocks,  and  even  mend 
the  gloves  and  sew  buttons  on  the  shoes  of 
the  young  girls  who  go  out  looking  so  trim 
and  flower-like  in  their  sweetness  and  their 
94 


HOME  DUTIES 


beauty.  Let  me  tell  you,  girls,  there  may 
come  a  day  when  you  will  sadly  miss  all  the 
mother  love  and  the  mother  petting,  when 
you  will  wish,  perhaps  too  late,  that  you  had 
been  more  considerate  and  less  self-absorbed. 
A  girl  has  out-of-school  duties  to  her 
father,  as  well  as  her  mother.  Fathers  toil 
early  and  late.  Some  of  them  get  very  little 
good  of  their  homes  except  on  Sunday,  that 
blessed  rest-day  which  comes  once  a  week  to 
give  freedom  from  business  and  opportunity 
for  loving  companionship  in  the  household. 
When  your  father  comes  in  at  night  fagged 
and  weary  with  the  long  day,  his  heart  warms 
and  his  face  lights  up  with  a  smile  if  his 
daughter  is  ready  to  welcome  him,  to  give 
him  the  easiest  chair  and  to  entertain  him 
with  her  story  of  the  day.  The  bond  be- 
tween fathers  and  daughters  is  very  close 
and  tender,  and  a  father  is  often  chivalrous 
and  lover-like  in  his  devotion  to  the  sweet 
girl  who  reminds  him  of  her  mother  as  she 
was  in  courting  days.  Do  not  be  so  busy, 
so  anxious  about  your  own  friends  and  your 
own  little  concerns,  that  you  have  no  leisure 

95 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

to  bestow  upon  your  father.  I  trust  that 
no  little  perplexity  of  your  school  life  ever 
makes  you  cross  or  fretful  at  home.  Per- 
plexities are  bound  to  come,  but  the  thing  to 
do  is  to  trample  them  under  our  feet  and 
meet  them  with  a  smile  and  not  with  a  frown. 
A  girl  I  knew  was  very  affectionate  and 
even  demonstrative  in  her  manner  toward  her 
parents.  She  never  failed  to  say  "  Good 
night,  mother,  dear,"  or  "  Good  morning, 
father,  dear,"  at  the  right  moment,  and  I 
am  sure  she  was  always  ready  with  a  kiss 
and  a  smile  just  when  these  were  expected. 
But  she  never  dreamed  of  helping  to  get 
supper  on  the  day  the  maid  was  out.  On 
that  afternoon  she  was  usually  engaged  in 
writing  a  composition  or  drawing  a  par- 
ticularly difficult  map.  She  never  offered  to 
dress  the  little  sister  in  the  morning,  or  to 
amuse  the  teething  baby.  If  she  set  her 
heart  upon  having  a  new  hat  or  jacket,  or  a 
set  of  furs,  or  any  somewhat  expensive  ar- 
ticle of  dress,  she  teased  her  father  until  his 
pocketbook  opened,  and  he  gave  her  what 
she  asked  for.  It  was  nothing  to  her  that 
96 


HOME  DUTIES 


he  should  go  shabbily  attired  or  wear  a 
threadbare  overcoat,  so  long  as  she  was  able 
to  vie  in  appearance  with  the  richest  girl  in 
her  class. 

Girls  do  not  transgress  in  this  way  of  set 
purpose.  Most  of  the  wrong  things  they 
do  are  done  from  want  of  thought.  They 
are  so  accustomed  to  being  put  in  the  fore- 
ground and  having  the  way  made  smooth  for 
them  that  they  accept  as  their  right  what  is 
freely  showered  upon  them  from  the  fathom- 
less love  of  the  parental  heart. 

An  out-of-school  duty  that  should  not  be 
neglected  is  to  keep  your  books  and  your 
clothing  and  everything  that  has  to  do  with 
school  where  you  can  easily  find  them  in  the 
morning.  In  some  houses  there  is  no  quiet 
until  Dorothy  and  Jean  are  fairly  down  the 
street  and  out  of  sight.  So  long  as  they  are 
on  the  block  there  is  the  probability  that  they 
will  come  flying  back,  looking  in  frantic  haste 
for  a  missing  grammar  or  an  exercise  or 
something  that  they  ought  to  have  had  in 
place  before  they  went  to  bed  the  night  be- 
fore. A  good  rule  is  to  be  entirely  ready  for 

97 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

the  morning  before  you  lay  your  head  upon 
your  pillow. 

All  through  your  life  it  will  be  a  good 
thing  for  you  to  keep  in  advance  of  your 
work.  Never  let  your  work  hurry  you,  but 
get  it  done  long  enough  beforehand  to  feel 
that  you  have  a  margin  of  time  for  any  other 
thing  that  may  arise.  You  can  do  this  by 
observing  a  little  system.  The  person  who 
has  system  not  only  has  a  place  for  every- 
thing and  has  everything  in  its  place,  but 
has  a  time  for  everything  and  does  every- 
thing in  its  time. 

If  you  have  undertaken  out  of  school  to 
help  another  girl  with  her  lessons,  or  if  you 
are  one  of  those  girls  to  whom  people  come 
when  they  want  something  done  in  the  line 
of  church  work,  you  will  need  to  guard  your 
promises.  There  are  girls  who  are  always 
ready  to  promise  anything  they  are  asked, 
but  who  are  very  disappointing  indeed  when 
it  comes  to  performing  what  they  have 
pledged.  Remember  that  for  you,  next  to 
school  duties,  just  now  come  home  duties, 
and  last  of  all  come  the  duties  that  lie  out- 
98 


HOME  DUTIES 


side  and  beyond  the  home.  If  you  bear  this 
in  mind,  you  will  not  get  duties  tangled  up. 
The  truth  is  they  never  conflict,  if  managed 
aright. 


99 


CHAPTER  XIV 

THE  ART  OF  COOKING 

T  WONDER  if  you  girls  read  Ruskin? 
Of  course  you  know  that  John  Rus- 
kin was  a  great  critic  and  essayist,  the  close 
friend  of  several  great  artists  and  as  well  the 
friend  and  champion  of  working  men.  Be- 
sides all  this  Mr.  Ruskin  wrote  books  which 
are  models  of  good  and  beautiful  English, 
so  that  no  class  in  English  literature  can  af- 
ford to  neglect  a  study  of  his  graceful  and 
vigorous  style.  In  one  of  his  books,  "  Ses- 
ame and  Lilies,"  Mr.  Ruskin  devotes  a 
good  deal  of  attention  to  young  girls  and 
gives  them  in  his  charming  way  no  little  ex- 
cellent advice.  He  says  among  other  things 
that  a  girl's  work,  her  mission  in  life,  is  to 
please  people  and  to  feed  them  in  dainty 
ways. 

100 


THE  ART  OF  COOKING 

You  are  pretty  sure  to  please  people  if 
you  set  before  them  the  things  they  like  to 
eat  served  in  a  manner  that  tempts  appetite. 
No  young  girl  can  be  considered  well  edu- 
cated who  does  not  know  how  to  cook. 

I  have  been  told  that  cooks  are  born  and 
not  made,  but  I  do  not  believe  a  bit  of  it. 
Any  girl  with  a  clever  brain  and  two  hands 
may  learn  how  to  make  everything  that  is 
needed  in  an  ordinary  meal  and  every  girl 
who  attends  a  cooking  class  will  tell  you  that 
the  art  of  cooking  includes  no  end  of  fun. 
To  cook  admirably  and  to  waste  no  good  ma- 
terial is  n,  real  feminine  accomplishment. 

"  That  young  girl  writes  a  good  composi- 
tion," I  once  heard  a  man  say,  "  but  does  she 
know  how  to  broil  a  beef  steak?  "  I  could 
have  told  him  that  the  girl  who  could  write 
and  speak  correctly  and  who  stood  highest 
in  her  classes  was  far  more  likely  to  be  an 
adept  in  broiling  and  baking  and  preparing 
a  salad  or  a  pudding  than  her  stupid  neigh- 
bor who  never  set  her  mind  on  gaining  in- 
tellectual culture.  Whoever  cultivates  her 
101 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

brain  most  carefully  will  likewise  excel  when 
she  tries  manual  training  and  will  show  the 
best  results  as  an  all-around  girl. 

I  take  it  for  granted  that  most  young  girls 
would  like  to  know  how  to  cook.  A  few 
years  ago  I  would  have  been  sure  that  all 
girls  desired  to  know  everything  they  could 
about  this  useful  and  necessary  art  of 
woman's  work.  But  I  found  in  connection 
with  classes  in  social  settlements  that  girls 
who  had  been  working  hard  all  day  in  shops 
and  factories  did  not  take  much  interest  in 
the  evening  in  a  chafing  dish  or  a  stove  or 
anything  connected  with  the  kitchen.  They 
told  me  that  they  were  too  tired  to  enjoy  this 
sort  of  work,  and  that  it  was  a  greater  rest 
and  refreshment  to  them  to  take  up  studies 
connected  with  books,  or  to  do  something 
which  would  help  them  in  making  their 
clothes. 

I  am  writing  for  schoolgirls,  and  I  feel 
quite  sure  that  they  sometimes  enjoy  drop- 
ping their  books  and  taking  hold  of  one  of 
the  most  practical  employments  in  life. 
When  you  think  of  it,  nothing  is  more  prac- 

102 


THE  ART  OF  COOKING 

tical  than  the  proper  preparation  of  daily 
food.  What  to  eat,  how  to  cook  it  and  how 
to  serve  it  are  departments  which  no  woman 
can  afford  to  neglect. 

Ill-cooked  and  ill-chosen  food  causes  indi- 
gestion, ill-temper  and  ill-health.  A  great 
deal  of  food  in  this  dear  country  of  ours  is 
ruined  in  the  cooking.  With  the  finest  mar- 
kets in  the  world,  with  plenty  of  everything 
brought  to  our  doors,  we  waste  and  destroy 
and  throw  away  food  which  in  other  coun- 
tries where  people  are  more  economical  is 
used  to  the  best  advantage,  and  then  we  won- 
der why  we  continue  poor.  We  might  as 
well  wonder  why  we  are  often  plain  when 
we  might  be  beautiful  and  cross  when  we 
might  be  amiable  and  out  of  spirits  when  we 
should  be  calm  and  tranquil.  Our  foolish 
extravagance  and  inexcusable  ignorance  are 
at  the  bottom  of  most  of  the  mischief. 

Of  course  every  girl  wants  to  be  attrac- 
tive in  appearance,  to  have  bright  eyes,  a 
smooth  skin,  and  a  look  of  vitality.  No  girl 
will  be  beautiful  or  have  anything  else  than 
a  sallow  skin,  ugly  pimples  and  dull  eyes,  if 
103 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

she  habitually  eats  poorly  cooked  food. 
There  is,  for  instance,  a  widespread  preju- 
dice against  hot  biscuits  and  coffee.  Soggy 
biscuits  and  muddy  coffee  are  enough  to 
poison  whoever  touches  them,  but  when  bis- 
cuits are  light  as  puffs,  and  coffee  is  clear  as 
amber,  both  are  innocuous  to  people  in  health. 
Every  girl  should  learn  how  to  make  light 
biscuits  and  clear  coffee,  and  this  part  of  her 
education  is  just  as  important  as  her  arith- 
metic, her  grammar,  her  French,  her  Ger- 
man, her  geometry  or  any  one  of  the  numer- 
ous branches  in  science  which  now  occupy  the 
attention  of  girls. 

The  best  cooking  school  any  girl  can  have 
is  her  mother's  kitchen,  provided  her  mother 
knows  how  to  cook.  Nothing  else  equals 
the  opportunity  one  has  just  there.  Three 
meals  a  day  are  set  upon  the  table  in  most 
houses.  The  father  comes  home  tired  after 
a  day's  work,  the  growing  boys  are  always 
hungry,  and  the  children  may  be  depended 
upon  to  eat  their  share.  It  does  not  seem  as 
if  it  would  take  a  great  deal  of  skill  to  make 
an  appetizing  plate  of  toast  and  a  really  good 
104 


THE  ART  OF  COOKING 

cup  of  tea  for  mother  when  she  has  a  head- 
ache, yet  I  know  any  number  of  girls  whose 
toast  is  a  scorched,  messy  looking  affair,  and 
whose  tea  is  not  fit  to  drink. 

A  girl  at  home  should  take  pains  about 
these  simple  everyday  things.  She  should 
learn  how  to  broil  steak  and  chops,  how  to 
cook  potatoes  in  many  delicious  ways,  how 
to  prepare  salads  in  a  variety  which  is  legion. 
Little  by  little,  if  a  girl  is  interested,  she  may 
acquire  the  art  of  cooking  well  at  home,  and 
especially  she  should  learn  how  to  make  a 
good  loaf  of  bread. 

Dear  girls,  believe  me  that  until  you  have 
really  tried  to  do  this  you  do  not  know  what 
an  accomplishment  it  is,  and  how  much  care 
and  trouble  must  be  taken  before  you  can 
know  the  right  quantity  of  flour  and  the 
right  quantity  of  yeast  and  the  length  of  time 
to  be  spent  in  kneading  the  bread  and  in 
letting  it  rise,  nor  have  you  the  least  idea 
about  the  temperature  of  the  oven.  In  the 
south,  where  bread  is  made  in  perfection,  I 
have  known  the  cook  to  go  downstairs  in  the 
middle  of  the  night  that  she  might  see  how 
105 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

her  bread  was  coming  on.  This  is  not  neces- 
sary, and  yet  bread  will  not  brook  neglect. 
It  must  be  carefully  watched  and  every  step 
of  the  process  must  receive  intelligent  care. 
Good  cooking  demands  as  much  thought  as 
any  other  good  thing  in  the  universe. 

An  artist  cannot  paint  a  picture,  nor,  for 
that  matter,  can  a  house  painter  decorate  a 
house,  without  taking  pains.  As  much 
thought  and  skill  and  dexterity  go  into  a  loaf 
of  bread  as  into  the  molding  of  a  statue  or 
the  weaving  of  tapestry  or  the  writing  of 
poetry.  Whatever  else  may  be  slighted, 
bread  requires  conformity  to  rule.  You 
have  heard  old-fashioned  housekeepers  de- 
clare that  they  were  independent  of  rules, 
that  they  made  things  by  using  their  judg- 
ment, and  truly  to  look  at  them  as  they  work 
one  would  think  this  so;  a  pinch  of  one  thing, 
a  sprinkle  of  another,  a  handful  of  a  third, 
a  few  ingredients  airily  tossed  together,  a 
few  magical  passes,  and  out  comes  the  souffle 
or  the  pudding  or  the  dumpling  light  as 
foam,  browned  to  perfection,  with  the  deli- 
cate flavor  that  a  chef  might  envy.  But  these 
1 06 


THE  ART  OF  COOKING 

good  cooks,  although  they  do  not  own  it, 
probably  automatically  adhere  to  rules. 
There  is  some  rule  that  they  observe,  and 
following  this  they  act  with  a  precision  which 
does  not  need  weighing  and  measuring. 
Most  of  us  get  on  better  if  we  keep  to  the 
rule.  A  good  cookbook  with  plain  direc- 
tions, absolutely  followed,  is  a  friend  worth 
having  in  the  house. 

There  is  fun  in  studying  cooking  in  a 
class.  A  half-dozen  girls  get  more  pleasure 
out  of  the  work  than  a  single  girl  can  when 
studying  by  herself.  Additional  pleasure 
comes  from  eating  what  has  been  cooked,  at 
the  close  of  the  lesson.  There  is  a  great  deal 
of  pleasure,  too,  in  issuing  invitations  to 
honored  guests  at  the  end  of  a  season,  sur- 
prising them  with  a  fine  dinner  or  a  dainty 
supper  served  in  a  style  of  which  any  caterer 
might  be  proud. 

The  advantage  of  cooking  schools  for  girls 
is  largely  found  in  the  fact  that  the  girls  there 
learn  a  good  deal  of  the  chemistry  of  cook- 
ing. They  are  told  the  why  and  the  where- 
fore. They  not  only  acquire  deftness  of 
107 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

touch,  but  they  learn  which  dishes  may  be 
served  together,  and  how  to  make  the  most 
of  small  portions.  The  success  of  a  meal 
depends  on  good  catering,  on  serving  the 
right  things,  in  the  right  order,  at  the  right 
time.  Good  housekeeping  means  a  wise  and 
discreet  selection  of  provisions.  Each  young 
girl  should  learn  how  to  market,  how  to 
cater  and  how  to  cook  and  then  when 
she  grows  up  she  will  be  her  mother's  capable 
helper,  and  should  she  marry  she  will  make 
a  good  wife,  either  for  a  poor  man  or  a  rich 
man,  just  as  it  happens. 


108 


CHAPTER  XV 

SKILLFUL    HANDS 

/^\F  all  wonderful  things  on  earth  the  hand 
is  surpassing  and  superlative  in  beauty 
and  capability.  Look  at  it.  Four  fingers 
and  a  thumb,  an  open  palm;  what  other  in- 
strument is  there  so  pliant,  so  flexible,  so 
obedient  to  its  owner's  will? 

Then,  girls,  as  if  one  hand  were  not 
enough,  each  of  us  has  two.  To  tell  the 
truth,  wre  do  not  make  half  the  use  we  ought 
of  the  poor  left  hand,  which  is  treated  like 
an  orphan  child  whose  education  is  neglected, 
while  everything  is  lavished  on  the  much 
prized  right  hand.  The  fact  is  we  all  ought 
to  be  able  to  use  both  hands  impartially,  to 
be  as  deft  and  clever  in  the  use  of  the  left 
hand  as  in  that  of  the  right. 

One  sign  of  a  good  brain  is  a  sure,  safe 
and  accurate  method  of  using  the  hands. 
109 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

You  may  fancy  that  it  is  very  important  for 
you  to  learn  a  good  deal  of  science,  ever  so 
much  history,  and  ever  so  much  arithmetic. 
But,  after  all,  it  is  just  as  important  that 
you  should  know  how  to  do  things  well, 
swiftly,  thoroughly  and  easily  with  the  hands. 
You  don't  want  to  be  awkward  and  clumsy 
in  using  fingers  and  thumb.  People  who  are 
skillful  in  the  use  of  their  hands  are  very 
seldom  lacking  in  efficiency  in  other  things. 

Every  girl  used  to  be  taught  to  do  plain 
needlework  beautifully  by  hand.  Before  the 
days  of  sewing  machines  no  young  girl  would 
have  been  considered  either  well  educated  or 
accomplished  who  did  not  know  how  to  make 
her  own  garments  with  dainty  neatness,  who 
could  not  darn  stockings  nicely,  and  who  was 
unskilled  in  the  art  of  setting  in  a  patch  and 
making  old  linen  last  after  it  had  begun  to 
break  here  and  there  in  thin  places.  I  think 
myself  that  to  do  plain  hand  sewing  with 
elegance  is  a  finer  accomplishment  than  to 
embroider  beautifully. 

Yet  to  be  sure,  embroidery  is  the  poetry 
of  the  needle.  I  have  seen  in  some  homes 
no 


SKILLFUL  HANDS 


pieces  of  artistic  embroidery  which  are  fit  to 
be  handed  down  as  heirlooms,  or  to  find  a 
permanent  place  in  some  museum  of  art. 
They  are  marvels  of  exquisite  shading  and 
coloring  and  resemble  the  most  beautiful 
specimens  of  work  with  the  brush. 

I  think  I  hear  Dorothy  remarking  to 
Gladys  that  for  her  part  she  does  not  like 
sewing  and  never  did;  that  she  has  heard  her 
mother  say  there  is  no  economy  in  making 
clothes  at  home,  when  they  may  be  bought 
at  reasonable  rates  in  the  shops,  and  that  she 
for  one  does  not  mean  to  be  coaxed  and  hum- 
bugged into  sitting  down  with  a  needle  when 
she  would  much  rather  be  doing  something 
else. 

Very  well,  Dorothy,  you  have  the  privilege 
of  candor,  but  just  listen  to  me,  my  dear. 

If  any  one  of  you  girls  is  conscious  of  a 
pronounced,  decided  and  strenuous  aversion 
to  the  manual  training  which  you  can  get  by 
learning  the  womanly  art  of  sewing,  then  I 
advise  you  for  your  own  sake  to  conquer  the 
aversion  long  enough  to  learn  what  you  don't 
like.  I  have  said  this  before  in  another  con- 
iii 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

nection.  I  now  repeat  that  nothing  is  better 
for  a  girl  in  the  line  of  mental  discipline  than 
resolutely  to  undertake  and  diligently  to  carry 
through  some  undertaking  which  does  not 
much  appeal  to  her.  Every  one  of  us  is 
stronger  if  now  and  then  she  climbs  up  some 
hill  of  difficulty  and  seats  herself  comfortably 
on  the  top  to  view  the  landscape  o'er.  Math- 
ematics or  needlework,  either  will  do,  if  we 
conquer  our  laziness. 

As  for  other  manual  training,  you  girls 
should  learn  to  handle  tools.  A  well  equipped 
tool  chest  is  as  valuable  a  possession  to  a  girl 
as  to  a  boy.  As  things  now  are,  thousands  of 
young  women  after  they  grow  up  will  have 
homes  of  their  own,  in  which  they  will  live 
and  reign  in  quite  contented  spinsterhood. 
Perhaps  you  will  be  stenographers,  artists  or 
newspaper  women,  by  and  by,  living  in  pleas- 
ant companionship  with  other  women  like 
yourselves,  without  even  a  brother  or  a  cousin 
to  help  you  along.  There  are  times  when  a 
man  in  the  house  is  a  great  comfort,  but  if 
there  should  not  be  a  convenient  masculine 
relative  within  call,  a  girl  who  can  use  a  ham- 
112 


SKILLFUL  HANDS 


mer,  a  saw  and  screw  driver,  who  can  open 
boxes  that  come  by  express,  and  nail  boxes 
up,  who  can  mend  something  that  is  broken 
and  do  her  own  household  tinkering  without 
outside  aid,  will  be  a  very  independent  girl. 

The  manual  training  class  is  supposed  not 
so  much  to  enable  you  to  do  marvelous  things 
in  school,  as  to  fit  you  for  taking  good  care 
of  yourself  in  practical  ways  later  in  life.  I 
am  disposed  to  include  under  the  head  of 
manual  training  some  things  that  most  girls 
find  very  pleasant.  Why  should  not  a 
schoolgirl  be  taught  to  drive,  to  ride,  to  row 
and  to  reef  a  sail?  All  the  outdoor  life  in 
which  the  hands  play  a  part  is  better  carried 
on  by  a  young  woman  whose  hands  have  been 
trained,  than  by  one  who  has  given  exclusive 
attention  to  her  mind  and  very  little  to  her 
body. 

If  I  were  you  I  would  care  a  good  deal 
about  the  beauty  of  the  hands.  They  should 
be  well  kept,  but  not  so  well  kept  that  their 
owners  do  no  useful  work.  For  instance, 
there  is  washing  the  dishes  —  a  homely  task 
which  is  seldom  properly  done  except  by  a 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

lady.  Of  course,  you  and  I  take  pride  in  the 
possession  of  beautiful  china.  In  a  New 
England  farmhouse  that  I  know  there  are  in- 
tact, not  a  piece  broken,  a  cup  nicked,  a  plat- 
ter chipped,  or  any  damage  done  anywhere, 
two  sets  of  ancestral  china.  The  china  was 
brought  from  England  in  the  early  days  of 
the  Massachusetts  colony,  and  it  has  been 
handed  down  from  mother  to  daughter  in  an 
unbroken  line  ever  since. 

"  How  have  you  managed  to  keep  your 
dishes  from  wreckage?  "  I  once  asked. 

'  These  dishes,"  I  was  told,  "  have  never 
been  trusted  to  anyone  out  of  the  family. 
They  have  been  uniformly  taken  care  of  by 
gentlewomen." 

I  am  not  sure  that  dishwashing  ought  not 
to  be  set  in  the  place  of  honor  in  the  manual 
training  of  girls.  Rightly  regarded  it  is 
feminine  work  of  the  finest  description.  One 
may  perform  a  great  deal  of  housework  and 
still  keep  her  hands  soft  and  white,  if  she 
will  be  careful  not  to  plunge  them  into  hot 
water  when  she  may  as  well  use  a  mop,  and 
if  she  will  protect  them  by  rubber  gloves 
114 


SKILLFUL  HANDS 


when  doing  tasks  which  would  make  them 
red  and  rough. 

One  word  more,  a  beautiful  hand  is  not 
improved  by  an  excessive  number  of  rings. 
Schoolgirls  do  not  wear  much  jewelry,  nor 
should  they.  But  as  you  grow  older  and 
leave  the  schoolroom  behind,  there  may  come 
the  desire  and  perhaps  the  temptation  to  wear 
a  good  deal  of  ornament.  Do  not  spoil  a 
pretty  hand  by  too  many  gems.  The  taste 
is  barbaric.  Take  pains  with  the  nails, 
which  are  the  finishing  touches  of  the  fingers, 
and  whatever  else  you  forget  never  omit  that 
language  of  the  cordial  handclasp,  which  sig- 
nifies sincerity  and  a  true  heart. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

MUSIC 

/TTVHE  plain  truth  is  that  to  study  music 
•*•  is  not  the  grind  it  used  to  be.  Pris- 
cilla,  daughter  of  Phyllis,  approaches  the 
piano  by  the  scientific  modern  method,  and 
by  easy  gradations.  Phyllis  used  to  be 
driven  to  her  practicing,  and  it  was  the  bug- 
bear of  her  life.  With  a  watch  by  her  side, 
or  an  eye  on  the  clock,  she  sat  on  the  backless 
music  stool,  and  pounded  away,  putting  her 
little  foot  on  the  loud  pedal,  that  the  noise 
might  be  deeper,  counting  one,  two,  three, 
four,  five,  over  and  over,  till  she  went  on  like 
an  automaton,  fingers  strumming,  voice  mark- 
ing time,  and  loathing  it  all  the  while.  Very 
severe  teachers  thumped  little  hands  if  they 
made  mistakes.  Very  rigid  mothers  exacted 
the  full  tale  of  half  hours  and  whole  hours, 
and  scolded  the  luckless  girl  who  lingered  on 
116 


MUSIC 

the  way  from  school  and  was  tardy  in  her 
duty  to  her  piano. 

As  for  the  neighbors,  they  hated  it,  too. 
Nothing  was  more  torturing  to  sensitive  ears 
than  the  dreary  repetition  of  five  finger  exer- 
cises, to  the  right,  to  the  left;  for  every  house 
had  its  piano,  and  every  family  with  daugh- 
ters had  several  of  them  drilling  at  one  and 
the  same  time. 

"  I  would  rather  study  astronomy,"  said 
Phyllis,  pouting,  when  her  mother  told  her 
that  her  music  lessons  were  to  begin  "  next 
Monday." 

"  Astronomy,"  replied  the  mother,  "  is  a 
mere  amusement.  Music  is  a  necessity  in 
education." 

Phyllis  had  no  taste  for  it,  but  that  made 
no  difference. 

We  have  learned  a  better  way,  as  well  as 
adopted  a  better  method,  and  Priscilla  of  the 
golden  braid  is  the  gainer.  Her  mother, 
Phyllis,  looks  on  in  pleased  appreciation 
when  she  finds  that  before  ever  she  touches 
the  keyboard  she  is  taught  the  value  of  dif- 
ferent notes,  is  trained  to  read  at  sight, 
117 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

and  is  introduced  intelligently  to  the  first 
principles  of  an  exact  science,  which  was  for- 
merly to  every  beginner  a  chaos  or  a  laby- 
rinth without  meaning  or  clue. 

Twenty  lessons  or  thirty  may  be  given 
before  the  keys  that  answer  to  the  score  are 
sounded  by  anyone  except  the  teacher.  Eye, 
ear  and  brain  are  trained  before  the  training 
of  wrist  and  fingers  is  attempted.  A  good 
deal  of  instruction  is  given  about  music  it- 
self, and  about  the  masters  of  music,  the 
great  creators  and  artists,  who  were  inter- 
preters of  the  soul  that  slumbers  in  the  silent 
instrument  and  awaits  a  musician  to  awaken 
it. 

Priscilla's  mother  was  expected  to  play  a 
piece  by  the  end  of  the  first  quarter.  Any 
jingling  tune  would  do,  but  if  the  tune  were 
not  forthcoming  papa  shook  his  head.  His 
money  was  being  wasted.  A  girl  who  could 
not  play  "  Home,  Sweet  Home,"  or  "  Mon- 
astery Bells,"  with  variations,  by  the  end  of 
the  second  quarter  was  pointed  out  as  a 
dunce. 

Many  girls  had  only  a  twelvemonth's  les- 
118 


MUSIC 

sons  allowed  them.  After  that  they  were 
expected  to  go  and  play  pieces  galore. 

Priscilla  will  probably  go  on  with  her  les- 
sons for  eight  or  ten  years,  and,  if  fortunate, 
may  study  at  some  great  musical  center 
abroad,  Stuttgart,  Munich,  Berlin  or  Vienna. 
She  will  not  only  play,  but  will  know  good 
playing  when  she  hears  it,  and  will  enjoy  the 
best  music.  A  source  of  unfailing  and  ex- 
quisite pleasure  will  be  opened  in  her  life. 

She  need  never  let  her  sense  of  enjoyment 
wane.  She  may  lose  facility  in  making  music 
for  other  people,  but  she  need  never  lose  the 
delight  that  comes  from  a  thorough  under- 
standing when  one  listens  to  an  orchestra  or 
a  single  performer.  Organ,  violin,  piano, 
bugle,  cornet,  mandolin,  harp,  each  and  all 
will  bestow  on  her  a  rare  felicity. 

But  Priscilla,  my  dear,  there  was  one  ad- 
vantage the  girl  of  other  days  had  that  you 
have  let  slip  away.  She  was  ready  to  play 
when  she  was  asked.  Friends  called,  and 
mamma  sent  for  her  daughter  to  help  enter- 
tain them.  Papa  was  tired.  He  threw  him- 
self back  in  his  big  armchair  and  put  his  feet 
119 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

on  the  fender,  and  the  lines  smoothed  out  of 
his  forehead,  the  pucker  faded  from  between 
his  eyes,  for  Phyllis  played  her  latest  piece, 
and  over  the  heart  of  the  weary  man  crept  a 
realization  of  divine  comfort;  he  was  at  home, 
the  spirit  of  household  peace  was  there,  and 
Phyllis  was  the  pride  of  his  eyes,  and  the  ful- 
fillment of  his  dreams.  She  played,  and 
father  and  mother  sang,  and  the  hour  was  a 
waft  from  paradise. 

May  I  advise  you  girls  who  with  Priscilla 
are  studying  in  a  class,  which  is  a  splendid 
way  to  study,  that  every  girl  of  you  should 
learn  to  play  accompaniments?  For  this 
you  need  precision  and  accuracy,  and  sym- 
pathy and  phrasing,  for  the  successful  ac- 
companist sustains  the  singer,  but  does  not 
overshadow  her.  Learn  to  accompany  your 
brother  on  the  violin.  Have  concerts  at 
home.  Keep  in  practice,  so  that  you  need 
not  always  offer  the  excuse  that  you  are  out 
of  it,  when  an  old-fashioned  friend  asks  you 
for  a  little  music.  Cultivate  memory.  It 
is  a  great  pity  to  be  in  bondage  to  your  notes. 
Have  your  fingers  so  trained  that  the  four- 
120 


MUSIC 

and-twenty  white  slaves,  the  four-and-twenty 
black,  on  the  piano  shall  obey  the  slightest 
call  those  magical  fingers  make  on  them. 

Music  does  something  for  us  in  mental 
discipline  that  nothing  else,  except  mathe- 
matics, can  do  so  thoroughly.  It  demands 
and  obtains  close  attention  and  swift  obe- 
dience. We  must  be  accurate.  We  must  be 
all  there,  not  half  on  the  playground,  or  half 
in  Japan,  when  we  are  studying.  Theory  or 
practice,  whatever  we  attack  in  music,  we 
must,  unless  we  have  exceptional  genius,  give 
our  whole  selves  to  it. 

To  be  an  accomplished  musician  you  must 
work,  and  you  cannot  quite  avoid  the 
drudgery,  but  the  drudgery  will  not  be  a 
hardship  as  it  used  to  be  to  Phyllis.  The 
thorny  path,  though  shorn  of  much  of  its  ter- 
ror now,  still  leads  to  glory  in  this  field. 

There  is  a  familiar  proverb  to  the  effect 
that  the  game  is  not  always  worth  the  candle. 
You  never  need  be  afraid,  if  the  game  for 
you  means  studying  something  that  obliges 
you  to  do  a  daily  task  and  that  suffers  if  you 
stop  for  a  day,  that  it  will  not  be  worth  a  half 
121 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

dozen  candles.  A  wise  man  once  said: 
"  Nothing  can  stand  before  a  day's  work." 
This  is  true  everywhere.  It  is  particularly 
true  in  this  realm  that  we  have  been  talking 
about. 


122 


CHAPTER  XVII 
THE  SCHOOLGIRL'S  ROOM 

1VTOT  long  ago  I  had  the  pleasure  of  vis- 
iting several  schools  for  girls,  schools 
in  which  the  students  represented  nearly  all 
the  states  in  the  Union.  They  were  veri- 
table rosebud  gardens  of  girls.  Seldom  have 
I  seen  so  many  pretty  maids  together  as  in 
these  institutions  where  young  women  in  the 
sweet  flush  of  the  dawn,  just  the  place  where 
the  brook  and  river  meet,  were  gathered  to 
be  educated.  Before  the  number  of  subjects 
with  which  they  were  familiar  I  bowed  my 
head  in  humility,  for  girls  are  far  more 
learned  now  than  they  used  to  be.  Yet, 
learned  or  not,  in  every  successive  year  a 
girl  is  like  the  girls  who  went  before  her  as 
the  daisies  of  one  season  are  like  the  daisies 
of  another.  A  number  of  girls  invited  me 
into  their  rooms,  and  entertained  me  there. 
123 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

Now,  whether  you  believe  it  or  not,  when 
a  girl  lets  one  look  at  her  room  she  reveals  a 
good  deal  of  her  character.  A  man's  room 
hardly  reflects  his  preferences  and  tastes  as 
a  girl's  does  hers.  All  the  rooms  I  visited 
left  on  my  mind  a  general  impression  of  ban- 
ners, photographs  and  bric-a-brac.  There 
were  cushions  as  a  matter  of  course,  and  most 
rooms  had  little  tables  with  a  tea  service  and 
book  shelves  on  the  walls  in  which  were  the 
favorites  of  their  owners. 

If  a  girl's  brother  is  in  Harvard,  crimson 
is  the  predominating  color  of  her  room.  If 
in  Yale  she  is  probably  a  devotee  of  the  blue, 
and  so  on.  The  college  colors  of  brother 
and  cousin  are  loyally  adopted  by  schoolgirls. 

As  a  rule,  girls  have  too  many  small  ob- 
jects in  their  rooms  which  have  to  be  taken 
care  of  and  which,  on  the  whole,  leave  the 
effect  of  a  crazy-quilt  on  memory.  Fancy 
being  ill  in  a  room  where  photographs  are 
pinned  on  every  available  space  on  the  wall, 
and  fancy  waking  up  at  night  with  the  moon- 
beams streaming  through  the  window  and 
lighting  the  faces  of  all  the  kith  and  kin,  the 
124 


THE  SCHOOLGIRL'S  ROOM 

girls  one  went  to  school  with  last  year,  the 
cousins  in  California  and  the  ideal  maids  and 
matrons  of  Shakespeare  or  Petrarch  or  the 
earlier  mythology. 

I  give  you  my  word  that  I  have  seen  speci- 
mens of  every  age,  from  early  Phoenecian 
and  Greek  art  to  the  most  popular  New  York 
studio,  huddled  together  in  the  room  of  a 
single  college  student.  Poor  child!  How 
could  she  ever  get  her  ideas  in  order  with  so 
confusing  a  jumble  about  her  wherever  she 
turned  ? 

As  to  photographs,  so  far  as  the  family  is 
concerned  I  advise  limiting  the  number  to  the 
dearest  dear.  One's  mother  is  one's  patron 
saint.  A  girl  away  from  home  always  wants 
to  say  good  morning  to  her  mother's  picture 
when  she  begins  the  day,  and  to  bid  that  dear 
mother  good  night  before  she  lays  her  head 
on  the  pillow.  On  the  wall  I  would  have 
one  Madonna,  not  more,  and  that  should  be 
the  one  among  Madonnas  that  I  loved  best. 
All  the  other  pictures  after  those  of  the  im- 
mediate family  circle  I  would  keep  in  a 
drawer  or  a  box,  taking  them  out  and  looking 

125 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

at  them  from  time  to  time,  but  not  allowing 
them  either  to  distract  my  attention  or  to  ask 
from  me  the  care  that  is  needed  if  they  are  to 
be  kept  from  the  all-pervading  dust. 

A  desk  is  a  necessity  for  a  girl  if  she  has 
many  letters  to  write  or  much  work  to  do  in 
preparing  essays  and  theses  or  other  written 
work. 

If  she  be  orderly  and  systematic  she  keeps 
her  desk  with  neat  precision  and  can  put  her 
hand  in  the  dark  on  anything  she  wants.  If 
you  happen  to  be  a  girl  whose  desk  is  usually 
at  sixes  and  sevens  you  will  tell  me  that  you 
find  occasional  clearings  up  much  easier  and 
simpler  than  continual  tidiness,  and  also  that 
you  never  have  any  trouble  in  finding  a  paper 
unless  some  one  else  takes  upon  her  the  task 
of  arranging  your  desk  for  you.  I  know 
that  you  are  right.  The  one  individual  pos- 
session which  no  one  should  invade  or  molest 
without  authority  from  the  owner  is  a  desk. 

Polly  may  keep  hers  in  exquisite  neatness. 

May,  on  the  contrary,  will  frequently  leave 

hers  in  what  looks  to  an  outsider  a  fearful 

mess.     But  it  is  the  privilege  of  both  girls 

126 


THE  SCHOOLGIRL'S  ROOM 

to  close  the  lid  and  to  answer  no  questions. 
As  a  matter  of  choice,  I  think  the  neat  girl's 
methods  are  the  better,  but,  as  we  all  know, 
there  is  such  a  thing  as  worshiping  system  to 
an  extent  that  it  defeats  its  own  end. 

Keep  your  desk  and  your  bureau  drawers, 
your  closet  shelves  and  everything  in  your 
room  in  perfect  order  if  you  can,  but  do  not 
forget  that  to  get  the  day's  work  done  well 
and  thoroughly  one  must  sometimes  sacrifice 
a  little  order. 

When  I  think  of  an  ideal  girl's  room,  my 
first  dream  is  of  purity.  Therefore  I  like  a 
white  room  with  pale  gray  paper  on  the 
walls,  a  small  bed  whitely  covered  and  cur- 
tained with  perhaps  a  few  roses  sprinkled 
here  and  there,  sparsely,  on  the  coverlet, 
snowy  curtains  at  the  windows,  looped  back 
with  delicate  pink,  and  if  possible  a  tall  mir- 
ror, in  which  my  little  maid  may  see  herself 
from  the  top  of  her  dainty  head  to  the  toes 
of  her  well-shod  feet.  I  would  have  this 
mirror  set  in  a  door  so  that  it  should  not  take 
up  any  space. 

A  single  good  picture  would  mean  more 
127 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

than  many  small  photographs,  and  I  would 
all  the  year  round  have  something  growing, 
English  ivy  in  vases  in  winter,  a  pot  of  forget- 
me-nots  or  a  fern  in  summer.  A  girl's  room 
should  always  have  a  few  flowers  in  it. 

As  for  her  toilet  table  its  belongings  should 
be  simple  and  immaculate,  with  very  little  in 
the  way  of  essences  or  cosmetics,  which  a 
young  girl  does  not  need.  Everything  should 
strike  the  note  of  an  exquisite  refinement.  A 
banjo  or  a  violin,  if  she  be  musical,  gives  an 
added  touch,  and  by  all  means  let  the  young 
girl  have  a  few  good  books,  well  bound, 
books  that  she  may  read  over  and  over,  and 
which  shall  become  her  daily  friends. 

Such  a  room  will  be  eloquent  of  a  girl's 
personality.  It  will  be  her  refuge  when  she 
is  tired,  and  in  it  she  may  have  many  a  con- 
fidential chat  with  the  girls  for  whom  she 
most  cares. 


128 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

HOME    STUDY 

daughter  would  be  much  more 
winsome  if  she  had  no  home  work 
to  do,"  said  a  girl's  mother  to  me  the  other 
day. 

The  girl  herself,  throwing  down  her  books 
with  an  air  of  disgust,  exclaimed,  as  if  tram- 
pling on  an  enemy:  "There!  I  hate  you. 
I  wish  I  need  never  see  you  again!  School 
all  day,  and  study  all  the  evening,  and  where 
does  there  come  in  the  time  for  any  fun?  " 
Where  indeed! 

And  yet  after  a  young  girl  leaves  the  pri- 
mary grades,  after  she  has  rounded  the  land- 
mark named  Cape  Twelve  or  Cape  Thir- 
teen, she  must  expect  to  have  a  certain 
amount  of  home  study  to  be  regularly  done, 
if  she  is  to  take  a  high  rank  in  her  classes. 
Every  schoolgirl  knows  this.  Now,  if  you 
129 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

are  a  schoolgirl,  you  belong  to  the  girl  friends 
I  am  addressing,  and  as  I  want  to  think  of 
you  as  sweet,  winsome  and  reasonable,  you 
will  let  me  speak  very  plainly,  will  you  not? 

The  study  periods  which  alternate  with 
recitations  cover  some  portion  of  the  work 
outlined  for  the  next  day.  But  they  do  not 
and  cannot  cover  the  whole  of  it.  You  may 
spend  them  in  studying  those  lessons  in  which 
you  are  weak,  and  in  which  you  are  most 
likely  to  need  some  help  from  your  teacher. 
But  in  order  to  do  full  justice  to  your  school, 
as  well  as  to  yourself,  in  order  to  maintain 
the  high  reputation  of  your  own  class,  you 
must  bestow  the  labor  of  a  quiet  hour  or  per- 
haps of  two  quiet  hours  at  home  on  your 
books. 

Two  hours  is  quite  enough.  You  should 
not  devote  more  time  than  this  to  your  home 
work.  The  question  is,  when  shall  you  take 
the  two  hours?  It  is  complicated  for  some 
of  you  in  several  ways.  You  may  take 
music  lessons,  or  else  you  may  have  to  give 
your  mother  some  aid  in  the  housekeeping, 
do  errands,  set  tables,  make  beds  and  wash 
130 


HOME  STUDY 


dishes,  and  either  way  you  have  less  time 
for  home  study  than  your  opposite  neighbor, 
whose  mother  requires  few  services,  and  who 
has  no  extra  studies.  Yet  you,  not  she,  must 
be  congratulated.  An  all-around  girl  must 
know  how  to  do  housework  as  well  as  shine 
in  school. 

There  is  everything  in  system.  Never  be- 
gin to  study  the  minute  you  come  in  from 
school.  Eat  something,  a  slice  of  bread  and 
butter,  or  a  little  fruit,  or  drink  a  glassful  of 
milk,  as  soon  as  you  take  off  your  hat.  Put 
your  books  and  every  thought  of  school  aside 
for  awhile.  Go  out  doors,  take  a  walk,  play 
tennis,  drop  in  upon  your  chum,  or  put  your 
room  in  order;  but  let  there  be  a  real  space 
between  school  work  and  home  work. 

In  boarding  schools,  where  the  girls  have 
a  schedule  appointed  for  them,  the  hours  of 
study  are  arranged  with  a  view  to  letting  the 
students  have  a  chance  for  play  as  well  as  for 
work. 

Whatever  time  you  select,  either  an  hour 
in  the  evening  and  another  in  the  morning, 
or  two  consecutive  hours  before  going  to  bed, 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

put  your  whole  self  into  the  work.  Don't  let 
your  brother  persuade  you  to  slip  off  with 
him  to  some  evening  of  pleasure,  or  your 
cousin  induce  you  to  go  to  her  birthday  party. 

Schoolgirls  have  nothing  to  do  with  so- 
ciety. You  cannot  go  to  parties  and  dances 
and  picnics  and  take  excursions  here  and 
there,  while  you  are  at  school,  without  fall- 
ing below  your  right  percentage,  and  incur- 
ring an  accumulation  of  neglected  work. 
Your  motto  must  be,  "  This  one  thing  I  do." 
This  school  time  is  your  seed  time.  If  you 
are  thorough  and  diligent  in  your  prepara- 
tion, you  will  have  ease  and  joy,  and  go  on 
with  a  flowing  sail  when  you  are  in  college, 
or  have  entered  some  field  of  business,  or  are 
a  home  daughter  with  social  engagements. 
All  this  will  be  later. 

But  school  .comes  first  in  a  schoolgirl's  life. 
If  you  have  lessons  in  music,  so  manage  your 
hours  for  practice  that  they  dovetail  with 
your  other  work.  So  with  any  other  accom- 
plishment. 

We  all  lose  a  great  many  precious  minutes 
by  dawdling.  A  girl  or  a  woman  who  goes 
132 


HOME  STUDY 


on  with  her  work  without  wasting  time,  will 
keep  ahead  of  her  work,  will  sit  in  the  box 
and  drive  it;  not  let  it  drive  her.  Hurry  and 
worry  make  home  work  a  dreadful  task. 
You  must  somehow  carry  your  work  lightly, 
as  if  it  were  a  pleasure,  and  not  a  doleful 
and  hated  duty.  Why  do  we  treat  duties  as 
if  they  must  be  doleful?  Duty  should  come 
to  us  wearing  a  face  like  the  sunrise. 

And,  girls,  do  not  look  down  on  father  and 
mother  because  they  cannot  help  you  over  the 
hard  places.  The  legitimate  helpers  for  you 
are  your  teachers.  Note  down  your  difficul- 
ties and  carry  them  to  the  class  room.  If  you 
are  a  good  student,  by  which  I  mean  one  who 
neglects  nothing  and  does  her  best,  the 
teacher  will  not  snub  you.  She  will  in  turn 
do  her  best  to  be  illuminating  on  dark  situa- 
tions and  to  show  you  how  to  cope  with  new 
problems. 

But  your  parents  have  left  their  school  days 
behind  them.  The  methods  of  study  have 
altered.  The  sums  are  footed  up,  the  pars- 
ing is  managed  differently ;  the  words  are  not 
pronounced  as  they  used  to  be.  Even  though 
133 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

your  father  be  a  doctor,  a  lawyer,  governor, 
statesman  or  successful  merchant,  he  would 
probably  have  to  go  to  school  again  to  take 
a  high  school  examination,  and  while  your 
mother  is  a  brilliant  woman  and  a  personage, 
she,  too,  has  forgotten  a  good  deal  that  she 
took  pains  to  learn.  Dear  girls,  don't  look 
down  on  us  older  ones.  Your  home  work  is 
very  formidable  in  our  eyes.  Don't  fancy 
we  underrate  it.  You  have  it  to  do.  Take 
it  as  your  day's  work. 

Never  mind  about  other  things.  Your 
dress,  your  friends,  your  fun,  are  all  subor- 
dinate to  your  day's  work;  the  school  work 
and  the  home  work  both. 


134 


CHAPTER  XIX 

NATURE    STUDY 

T^JATURE  study  is  supposed  to  be  a  quite 
different  thing  from  the  study  of  books. 
In  a  way  it  may  be  true  that  the  two  kinds  of 
study  are  not  very  much  alike,  but  in  another 
way  they  cannot  be  separated.  Nature  is 
around  us  wherever  we  turn;  above  us 
stretches  the  sky;  we  breathe  the  air;  we 
have,  whether  we  live  in  town  or  in  the  coun- 
try, the  sights  and  sounds  of  nature  near  us 
all  the  time.  If  we  have  only  a  little  back 
yard  with  a  small  plot  of  grass  and  a  pot  or 
two  of  flowers,  if  our  only  acquaintance  with 
birds  is  derived  from  a  canary  or  a  parrot  in 
a  cage,  we  still  may  study  nature,  although 
not  with  the  same  degree  of  interest  that  will 
be  ours  when  we  make  excursions  to  green 
fields. 

I  take  it  for  granted  that  the  girls  who 

135 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

are  studying  nature  are  doing  so  to  some  pur- 
pose. Every  one  of  us  ought  to  know  by 
sight  and  touch  the  trees  in  the  locality  nearest 
our  homes.  We  should  know  them  by  their 
peculiarities  of  bark  and  branch  and  bud  and 
leaf.  We  should  know  the  flowers  that 
grow  in  our  countryside,  recognizing  them  by 
their  peculiarities  of  root,  stem  and  flower,  of 
color  and  perfume. 

We  should  likewise  know  the  birds.  Noth- 
ing is  more  absorbing  than  the  study  of  birds. 
They  are  fascinating  little  creatures.  Their 
habits,  manners  and  customs  are  not  so  very 
opposite  our  own  when  we  really  penetrate 
their  secrets.  In  a  single  rather  small  neigh- 
borhood in  New  Jersey  a  bird  lover  last  sum- 
mer counted  no  less  than  fifty-two  varieties 
of  birds.  Their  migrations,  their  nests,  their 
patience  in  finding  food  for  their  young,  the 
mother's  and  father's  care  in  showing  the 
young  birds  how  to  fly,  all  these  are  interest- 
ing parts  of  nature  study. 

But  it  is  not  so  much  of  this  that  I  am 
thinking  as  I  write  to  you,  as  of  the  way  in 
which  we  may  help  one  another  in  these  days. 
136 


NATURE  STUDY 


Girls  who  live  in  the  country  ought  to  have  a 
mission  to  their  city  cousins,  and  when  spring 
and  summer  bring  their  pleasant  days  boxes 
of  wild  flowers  and  garden  flowers,  too, 
should  be  sent  weekly  to  the  schoolrooms 
where  the  pupils  have  no  easy  way  of  getting 
specimens  for  themselves.  Schools  in  differ- 
ent parts  of  the  country  should  exchange 
flowers,  shells  and  other  interesting  proper- 
ties of  the  nature  study  class,  and  it  would  not 
be  at  all  a  bad  idea  if  there  were  a  regular 
system  of  correspondence  between  Jean  of 
the  little  village  and  Betty  of  the  big  city,  all 
about  the  work  each  was  doing  in  her  study 
of  nature. 

Another  helpful  thing  that  I  recommend 
is  the  marking  of  passages  in  the  poetry  and 
prose  that  you  read  with  an  especial  look  to 
their  bearing  on  nature.  You  will  find  that 
the  poets  care  a  great  deal  about  the  winds 
and  the  waves,  the  sky  and  the  earth,  and 
that  real  poetry  is  full  of  beautiful  allusions 
to  the  phenomena  of  the  world  we  live  in. 
Tennyson,  whom  you  will  study  in  your 
classes  in  English  literature,  has  so  much  in- 

137 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

timate  knowledge  of  nature  that  his  poetry 
is  almost  a  guide  book  to  the  flowers  of  his 
native  land.  Longfellow,  Whittier  and 
Emerson  have  a  great  deal  to  say  about  na- 
ture. When  you  read  the  great  masters  of 
fiction  you  will  find  that  they  have  whole 
pages  devoted  to  descriptions  of  scenery  and 
that  some  of  them  paint  nature  in  words  as 
if  with  the  brush  of  an  artist.  A  good  plan 
is  to  have  a  commonplace  book  and  when- 
ever you  find  something  that  you  like  write 
it  down  for  future  reference. 

When  I  was  a  girl  we  studied  botany  out 
under  the  trees.  There  was  a  particularly 
charming  bit  of  woodland  near  our  school, 
and  our  nature  study  was  always  carried  on 
out-of-doors.  Our  teacher  had  a  seat  on  a 
gray  rock,  covered  with  a  blanket  shawl. 
Maybe  you  never  heard  of  a  blanket  shawl, 
but  if  you  had  gone  with  Miss  Jane  and  had 
been  privileged  to  carry  her  Scotch  plaid  over 
your  arm  you  would  have  known  what  a  de- 
lightful and  convenient  wrap  it  was. 

The  girls  grouped  themselves  around  on 
the  grass  near  a  brookside  and  as  the  lesson 
138 


NATURE  STUDY 


went  on  the  brook  sang  and  sparkled  and  the 
sound  of  its  lullaby  and  the  gleam  of  its 
waters  made  music  and  sunshine  in  our  souls. 
We  learned  a  great  deal  about  botany  in 
those  enchanted  afternoons,  and  we  learned, 
too,  a  love  of  nature  that  is  not  gained  by 
those  who  study  her  only  in  dried  specimens 
between  whitewashed  walls. 

You  may  be  interested  to  know  that  we 
always  carried  a  luncheon  on  the  expeditions, 
and  it  was  not  the  least  interesting  part  of 
the  occasion.  Girls  who  fell  below  a  certain 
percentage  in  their  studies  were  not  permitted 
to  take  up  botany  in  their  work.  The  op- 
portunity of  studying  nature  was  thus  made 
very  honorable  and  precious,  and  we  held  it 
as  something  worth  striving  for. 

The  study  of  astronomy  captivates  those 
who  have  a  scientific  turn  of  mind.  To  learn 
the  names  of  the  constellations  and  to  recog- 
nize some  of  the  planets  when  they  appear 
above  the  horizon  is  not  beyond  any  ordinary 
mind,  but  the  study  of  astronomy  is,  on  the 
whole,  too  abstruse  to  be  attractive  to  very 
young  girls.  Definitions  and  formulas  you 
139 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

may  learn,  but  to  grasp  the  principles  of 
astronomy  you  require  maturity  and  insight; 
for  these  you  must  wait.  But  you  need  not 
wait  to  learn  by  heart  Addison's  exquisite 
lyric  that  begins : 

"  The  spacious  firmament  on  high, 
And  all  the  blue,  ethereal  sky, 
And  spangled  heavens  a  shining  frame, 
Their  great  original  proclaim." 

I  knew  a  wee  tot  once,  a  dimpled  creature 
with  serious  eyes,  who  did  not  want  to  take 
lessons  in  music.  Lifting  her  little  hand  she 
pointed  upward  and  said :  "  I  would  rather 
study  astronomy."  Although  the  child  did 
not  know  it,  astronomy  and  music  and  mathe- 
matics are  all  somehow  akin  to  one  another, 
and  she  who  is  proficient  in  any  one  of  them 
may  hope  to  become  proficient  in  them  all. 

One  April  day  as  I  watched  the  birds,  our 
little  brothers  of  the  air,  busy  with  their 
housekeeping,  I  wrote  a  bit  of  verse  that  you 
may  like  in  any  month  of  the  year,  since, 
though  it  has  an  April  measure,  you  may 
read  it  in  May  or  June,  and  like  it  just  as 
well. 

140 


NATURE  STUDY 


THE  BUILDING  OF  THE  NEST 

They  '11  come  again  to  the  apple  tree  — 

Robin  and  all  the  rest  — 
When  the  orchard  branches  are  fair  to  see, 

In  the  snow  of  the  blossom  drest ; 
And  the  prettiest  thing  in  the  world  will  be 

The  building  of  the  nest. 

Weaving  it  well,  so  round  and  trim. 

Hollowing  it  with  care, 
Nothing  too  far  away  for  him, 

Nothing  for  her  too  fair, 
Hanging  it  safe  on  the  topmost  limb, 

Their  castle  in  the  air. 

Ah!  mother-bird,  you  '11  have  weary  days, 
When  the  eggs  are  under  your  breast, 

And  shadow  may  darken  the  dancing  rays 
When  the  wee  ones  leave  the  nest ; 

But  they  '11  find  their  wings  in  glad  amaze; 
And  God  will  see  to  the  rest. 

So  come  to  the  trees  with  all  your  train 
When  the  apple  blossoms  grow ; 

Through  the  April  shimmer  of  sun  and  rain, 
Go  flying  to  and  fro ; 

And  sing  to  our  hearts  as  we  watch  again 
Your  fairy  buildings  grow. 


CHAPTER  XX 

FALSE   VALUES 

T  HOPE  you  won't  be  frightened  or  fancy 
•*•  that  it  is  not  of  importance  to  schoolgirls 
when  I  ask  you  to  talk  with  me  about  a  sense 
of  proportion.  Very  few  of  us  have  just  that 
right  idea  of  the  real  value  of  things  that 
makes  us  keep  our  lives  well  balanced. 

Most  of  us  run  to  extremes.  For  in- 
stance, there  is  Annie  who  feels  that  nothing 
is  so  needful  as  to  be  always  tidy  and  well 
dressed ;  from  her  head  to  her  feet  Annie  is  so 
trim  and  shining  that  it  is  a  positive  delight 
to  look  at  her.  She  boasts  that  she  never 
wears  the  same  white  shirt  waist  two  days 
in  succession,  that  her  frocks  and  her  petti- 
coats are  always  fresh  from  the  laundry  and 
that  she  never  has  so  much  as  a  hair  ribbon 
out  of  place. 

I  hold  rather  rigid  views  about  neatness 
142 


FALSE  VALUES 


myself,  and  I  think  it  inexcusable  in  a  girl  to 
have  boots  run  down  at  the  heels  and  lacking 
buttons,  or  to  wear  gloves  that  should  be 
mended,  but  when  I  remember  that  Annie's 
mother  keeps  only  one  maid,  and  that  her 
father  is  a  clerk  on  a  small  salary,  and  there 
are  four  other  children  in  the  family,  I  am 
driven  to  the  conclusion  that  the  number  of 
shirt  waists  in  the  wash  every  week  convicts 
Annie  of  extreme  selfishness.  She  purchases 
her  immaculate  appearance  at  too  great  a 
cost,  since  she  is  far  too  busy  with  high  school 
work  to  do  her  own  washing  and  ironing. 
When  a  girl  exalts  one  good  quality  at  the 
expense  of  others,  and  gratifies  her  taste 
through  the  self-denial  of  a  hard-worked 
mother,  she  shows  very  plainly  that  she  has 
no  sense  of  proportion. 

I  could  tell  you  of  women,  not  schoolgirls, 
who  having  failed  to  secure  a  true  feeling  for 
harmony  when  they  were  young,  have  made 
life  a  burden  for  everybody  belonging  to 
them  ever  since  they  grew  up.  They  have 
made  a  fetish  of  system;  having  determined 
to  have  breakfast  at  a  fixed  hour,  they  have 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

been  wretched  themselves  and  made  every- 
body else  so,  if  a  single  person  in  the  family 
came  down  a  few  minutes  after  the  clock 
had  struck  seven  or  eight,  as  the  case  might 
be.  Their  housework  had  to  be  done  on  cer- 
tain days,  at  any  cost.  There  was  no  free- 
dom or  elasticity  in  their  regime ;  they  lacked 
a  sense  of  proportion.  System  is  an  excellent 
servant,  but  when  it  is  made  a  master  it  be- 
comes the  worst  of  tyrants.  I  want  you  to 
do  your  work  according  to  method,  but 
occasionally  put  the  method  aside  if  the  inter- 
ruption will  tend  to  the  general  well-being 
of  the  day. 

In  one  of  Dickens'  novels  he  introduces  us 
to  a  character  whose  name  is  Mrs.  Jellyby. 
This  lady  is  very  charitable  and  spends  her 
time  in  doing  good  works.  She  writes  in- 
numerable letters  and  sends  them  to  the  ends 
of  the  earth.  She  carries  on  societies  that 
make  flannel  skirts  for  children  in  Africa  and 
send  leaflets  in  an  unknown  tongue  to  people 
who  cannot  read.  Of  course,  there  is  extrav- 
agance in  this  description,  and  yet  there  are 
women  of  the  Jellyby  type  in  the  world. 
144 


FALSE  VALUES 


Their  missionary  effort  is  not  practicable,  nor 
sensible.  They  intrude  into  homes  where 
they  are  not  wanted,  and  ask  impertinent 
questions  of  the  poor,  and  bestow  alms  where 
almsgiving  is  superfluous.  Very  likely  all 
the  time  they  are  neglecting  home  duties. 
"  Do  the  next  thing,"  is  a  good  motto  for 
most  of  us.  The  Jellyby  children  were 
falling  down  stairs  and  crying  for  bread, 
their  father  and  their  eldest  sister  were  at 
their  wits'  end,  while  Mrs.  Jellyby  remained 
absorbed  in  her  several  schemes  of  benevo- 
lence. She  was  a  person  who  had  no  sense 
of  proportion. 

Helen,  who  used  to  be  my  neighbor,  so 
worshipped  truth-telling  that  it  was  difficult 
to  carry  on  an  ordinary  conversation,  if  she 
were  in  the  company.  She  utterly  refused 
to  be  accurate  or  definite  about  anything  lest 
by  chance  she  should  say  what  was  not  liter- 
ally true.  You  could  never  bring  her  to  a 
positive  statement.  She  always  hedged  with 
"  I  think,"  "  I  fancy  "  or  "  It  is  my  impres- 
sion." And  more  times  than  I  can  tell  you, 
she  came  back  after  a  call  to  correct  what  she 
H5 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

feared  might  have  been  too  highly  colored. 
Having  no  imagination  herself,  she  could  not 
make  allowances  for  it  in  her  friends.  The 
worst  of  the  matter  was  that  Helen's  truth- 
telling  laid  a  burden  not  on  herself  alone  but 
on  the  rest  of  us.  If  anyone  related  an  inci- 
dent in  her  hearing  and  varied  the  telling  in 
some  trifling  detail,  Helen  was  on  the  alert 
to  set  the  narrator  right  and  rectify  the  mis- 
take. It  was  maddening  to  have  her  rush  in 
when  you  mentioned  that  you  had  gone  to 
town  on  Friday  at  noon,  with  the  correction 
"  It  was  eleven  o'clock,  auntie,  dear,  not 
twelve,  when  you  took  the  train."  We  must 
tell  the  truth,  girls,  according  to  the  highest 
standards  of  ethics,  and  we  must  never  de- 
liberately stain  our  souls  with  falsehood,  but 
a  martinet  like  Helen  mistakes  the  husk  for 
the  kernel  and  is  likely  to  be  persona  non 
grata  in  society  to  the  end  of  her  days. 

Equally  unfortunate  is  Marcia,  who  is  so 
resolved  on  saying  nothing  unkind  about  any- 
body that  she  at  times  preserves  a  silence 
which  can  be  easily  misunderstood,  and  which 
146 


FALSE  VALUES 


is  much  more  hurtful  to  her  neighbors  than 
an  occasional  criticism  would  be.  Our  tem- 
peraments are  diverse.  Some  of  us  are  im- 
pulsive, emotional  and  impetuous.  Some  of 
us  speak  before  we  think;  some  of  us  have 
looked  so  long  at  one  good  thing  in  life  and 
conduct,  that  we  can  see  nothing  else.  Good 
manners  and  decorum,  savoir  faire  and  the 
graceful  carriage  that  comes  from  mingling 
with  high-bred  people  are  very  charming. 
Yet  it  is  possible  to  set  too  high  a  value  on 
these  and  to  overlook  real  worth  in  some  one 
who  is  shy  and  awkward  and  who  has  not 
had  the  advantage  of  much  social  training. 
Robert  Burns  has  the  true  ring  in  his  famous 
lyric,  familiar  to  every  reader  of  the  English 
tongue, 

"  The  rank  is  but  the  guinea's  stamp, 
The  man  's  the  gold  for  a'  that." 

We  need  a  sense  of  proportion  in  our 
friendships.  I  think  I  ought  to  put  the  em- 
phasis of  this  talk  just  here,  for  nothing  is 
more  harmful  to  girls  than  exclusive  friend- 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

ship,  in  which  two  of  them  are  so  absorbed 
in  each  other  that  they  have  no  room  for  an- 
other thought  in  the  world. 

I  have  seen  Amy  so  devoted  to  Phyllis  that 
she  was  wretched  when  Phyllis  went  away 
to  school,  actually  pining  and  being  ill  as  if 
she  could  take  no  more  interest  in  life.  This 
kind  of  friendship  acts  very  badly  on  all  con- 
cerned. The  girl  who  clings  as  the  vine 
clings  to  the  tree  is  a  parasite.  She  chokes 
out  the  wholesome  life  of  the  one  to  whom 
she  clings,  and  she  gets  no  good  herself. 

Whatever  you  do,  dear  girls,  I  beg  of  you 
to  avoid  friendships  that  use  up  your  vitality, 
make  you  negligent  of  duty  and  prevent  you 
from  making  the  best  of  life  as  you  go 
on.  A  girl  may  in  secret  cherish  a  sort  of 
devotion  to  somebody  she  hardly  knows,  liv- 
ing a  dream  life  that  unfits  her  for  either 
work  or  play.  In  friendship,  dear  girl,  cul- 
tivate a  sense  of  proportion. 


148 


CHAPTER  XXI 

THE  SCHOOLGIRL'S  CHUM 

It  CHOOSING  partners"  sounds  as  if 
^^  we  were  going  to  play  a  game,  and, 
in  fact,  that  is  just  what  we  are  doing  every 
day  of  our  lives.  Whether  we  are  in  school 
or  at  home,  busy  or  idle,  happy  or  sorrowful, 
we  are  always  playing  the  great  game  that 
begins  when  we  are  babies  and  goes  on  till 
we  are  grandmothers. 

It  is  very  funny,  isn't  it,  to  think  of  ever 
being  a  grandmother,  when  one  is  only  four- 
teen or  fifteen,  or  maybe  younger?  But  I 
have  been  looking  at  the  picture  of  a  girl  who 
is  a  grandmother,  a  picture  taken  when  she 
was  a  schoolgirl,  with  dancing  eyes  and  coal- 
black  hair  and  merry  dimples,  when  she  was 
as  gay  and  light-hearted  as  any  of  you.  She 
wore  a  yellow  silk  frock,  and  a  black  silk 
apron  with  pockets  and  ruffles,  a  ruffled  silk 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

mantilla  over  her  shoulders,  and  she  had  a 
little  bonnet  tied  under  her  chin.  It  was  a 
droll  way  of  dressing,  but  it  was  the  fashion 
then,  and  it  looked  as  pretty  as  your  fashions 
do  now. 

It  is  always  the  face  that  matters  most,  and 
fashions  have  little  to  do  with  the  looks  of 
sweet  girls.  This  girl  has  never  lost  her 
beauty,  nor  her  trick  of  smiling  with  dimples 
that  chase  one  another  over  her  face,  and  she 
is  a  bewitching  grandmother  and  fairy  god- 
mother to  a  bevy  of  young  people. 

Choosing  partners  was  what  I  thought  of 
when  I  looked  at  her,  for  she  was  one  that 
everybody  wanted  to  choose.  She  had  her 
chums,  and  her  comrades,  and  generally  there 
was  one  a  wee  bit  dearer  than  the  others. 

On  the  day  that  school  opens  there  may  be 
sixty  girls  in  a  class,  and  they  may  be  total 
strangers  one  to  another.  But  very  soon 
they  will  drift  into  groups  and  into  circles  of 
threes  and  fours  and  finally  you  will  see  them 
walking  home  together  or  strolling  about  the 
playground  or  the  campus,  two  and  two. 
Nothing  is  so  unnatural  in  a  schoolgirl  as  to 
150 


THE  SCHOOLGIRL'S  CHUM 

have  no  friends.  Our  friendships  mean  a 
great  deal  to  us  when  we  are  growing  up,  a 
great  deal  more  than  older  people  dream. 

To  share  one's  desk  or  one's  room  with  a 
disagreeable  girl,  or  with  a  girl  who  is  not 
in  sympathy  with  one,  is  a  real  misery.  The 
next  worst  thing  is  to  have  a  chum  forced  on 
one  against  her  will.  Occasionally  a  teacher 
insists  on  putting  together  two  girls  who  be- 
long apart.  The  result  is  seldom  blissful. 
Once  in  awhile  a  mother  makes  the  mistake 
of  harping  on  the  grace  and  amiability  and 
the  cleverness  of  Maude  or  Mabel  to  Mary 
and  Jane,  who  very  probably  wish  nothing  to 
do  with  either  of  the  paragons.  There  is  no 
surer  way  of  antagonizing  a  girl  and  setting 
her  against  somebody  else  than  the  way  of 
continually  praising  the  somebody,  and  show- 
ing off  her  good  qualities  at  the  expense  of 
the  other. 

We  have  to  choose  our  partners  on  the 
road.  We  do  it  in  the  schoolroom,  we  do  it 
in  the  playground,  we  do  it  everywhere. 
Our  partners  and  chums  are  the  ones  who 
best  suit  us.  They  do  not  misunderstand  us. 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

We  do  not  have  to  talk  with  them  all  the 
time,  or  entertain  them,  or  make  any  par- 
ticular effort  to  be  pleasing,  when  in  their 
society.  They  and  we  may  sit  in  silence  for 
hours,  and  yet  have  a  very  good  time. 

Our  friends  are  our  best  helpers.  They 
may  not  always  like  the  same  studies  and  the 
same  recreations,  but  there  is  one  thing  in 
which  they  do  not  differ  from  ourselves ;  they 
will  have  the  same  standards  of  honor.  A 
truthful  girl  cannot  make  a  friend  of  a  hypo- 
crite, nor  an  honest  girl  associate  on  familiar 
terms  with  one  who  cheats.  You  will  never 
find  two  girls  united  in  strong  friendship 
when  one  is  coarse  and  vulgar  and  the  other 
modest  and  refined. 

In  friendship  like  attracts  like.  There 
has  to  be  similarity  of  principle  and  motive. 
You  and  your  partner  must  both  be  sincere, 
both  try  to  do  the  best  of  which  you  are 
capable,  and  both  combine  to  help  one  an- 
other toward  the  best  things.  Unless  this  is 
so  you  may  be  acquaintances,  but  you  cannot 
be  partners. 

Without  our  knowledge  we  gain  or  lose 
152 


THE  SCHOOLGIRL'S  CHUM 

through  our  friendships.  There  is  Janet 
who  is  very  easily  impressed.  I  can  tell  at 
a  glance  with  what  girls  Janet  has  been  asso- 
ciating when  she  comes  to  see  me,  after  the  ab- 
sence of  a  week  or  a  month.  If  she  has  been 
very  much  with  Hildah  she  drops  her  final 
g's  and  says  "  mornin'  "  and  "  evenin'  "  in- 
stead of  morning  and  evening.  If  Sarah  has 
been  her  chief  companion,  she  has  adopted 
the  broad  a  and  uses  it  unsparingly.  If  Mil- 
dred has  been  her  partner  for  the  time,  she 
has  long  o's  and  rolling  r's  in  her  vocabulary. 
Very  few  girls  take  the  color  of  the  last  girl 
they  have  been  with  as  Janet  does.  She  will 
do  this  all  through  life,  for  Janet's  soul  is  an 
instrument  that  responds  as  the  keys  on  the 
piano  do  to  every  touch. 

Her  cousin  is  in  contrast  to  this  and  be- 
longs to  an  entirely  different  type.  She  is  an 
up  and  down  sort  of  girl,  who  stands  on  her 
own  feet,  and  receives  comparatively  little 
from  other  people.  The  teachers  say  that 
Janet  is  a  more  receptive  pupil  than  Marjorie 
and  much  more  easily  taught.  Marjorie's 
own  mother  often  wishes  that  she  were  more 

153 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

flexible  and  less  self-centered.  She  needs  a 
partner  with  a  personality  stronger  than  hers, 
and  a  nature  open  to  outside  influences,  but  it 
will  not  be  easy  for  her  to  find  and  choose 
a  mate. 

Do  not  let  anybody  laugh  at  you  because 
you  are  enthusiastic  in  friendship.  Do  not 
let  anyone  make  a  jest  of  the  happiest  and 
best  thing  that  comes  into  your  youthful  lives. 
The  friendships  of  the  schoolgirl  may  last 
always,  or  may  be  forgotten  a  few  years 
hence.  What  becomes  of  them  hereafter  is 
of  no  moment  at  this  time,  the  important 
thing  is  that  you  shall  have  friends  with 
whom  you  can  talk  and  study,  who  will  share 
your  ambitions  and  guard  your  innocent  se- 
crets and  help  you  play  the  game  to  advan- 
tage, where  you  are  now.  Do  not  let  anyone 
come  between  you  and  your  dearest  friend. 
Avoid  envy  and  jealousy,  and  if  your  friend 
is  better  than  you  and  gains  more  prizes  and 
reaches  a  higher  mark  in  the  class,  take  pride 
in  what  she  does  and  be  above  anything  mean 
or  petty  on  your  own  account.  Your  part- 
ner's triumphs  are  your  own. 
154 


THE  SCHOOLGIRL'S  CHUM 

I  am  glad  to  note  that  schoolgirls  are  dem- 
ocratic. They  never  choose  a  partner  be- 
cause her  father  is  rich,  or  her  uncle  is  fa- 
mous, or  decide  against  one  because  they 
never  heard  of  her  people.  They  care  noth- 
ing whatever  about  her  dress,  but  they  do 
care  about  her  manners  and  her  ways.  Per- 
sonality counts  for  much  with  schoolgirls. 
They  are  careless  about  social  distinctions,  but 
they  choose  for  friends  those  they  love  best. 


155 


CHAPTER  XXII 

BOY   FRIENDS 

A  GIRL  who  has  brothers  is  never  at  a 
loss  for  comrades  if  her  brothers  have 
the  right  bringing  up.  There  are  brothers 
and  brothers,  however.  I  heard  of  one  not 
long  ago  who  was  ashamed  to  be  seen  walk- 
ing to  school  with  his  sister,  and  who  refused 
to  carry  her  books  or  her  umbrella  on  a  rainy 
day.  That  boy  may  one  of  these  days  be 
very  attentive  to  somebody  else's  sister,  but 
he  will  not  prove  a  good  friend  for  all  that. 
He  has  missed  the  home  training  which  lies 
at  the  foundation  of  all  friendship.  Boys 
and  girls  in  the  same  family  and  under  the 
same  roof  should  be  good  friends.  Neigh- 
bors who  attend  school  together  should 
equally  be  friends.  The  boy  next  door  and 
the  girl  next  door  ought  not  to  be  strangers, 
and  in  every  street  the  young  people  who  are 


BOY  FRIENDS 


growing  up  together  should  have  good  times, 
and  realize  what  it  means  to  be  friendly. 

This  does  not  mean  that  boys  and  girls 
should  be  foolishly  sentimental.  Nor  do  I 
think  they  often  are.  You  cannot  be  senti- 
mental about  a  boy  who  is  in  the  same  class 
with  you,  who  helps  you  with  your  algebra, 
and  it  may  be  is  glad  of  your  help  in  his 
Latin  translation.  So  long  as  boys  and  girls 
enjoy  outdoor  games  and  indoor  pleasures 
together,  there  is  nothing  to  be  criticised  in 
their  friendship.  It  is  only  when  they  begin 
to  be  mysterious  and  furtive  about  it  that 
their  mothers  need  to  take  alarm. 

For  instance,  when  Willie  hangs  about  the 
door  in  the  dusk  and  does  not  come  in,  but 
waits  for  Mary  to  steal  out  and  meet  him  at 
the  gate,  there  is  room  for  complaint. 
Mothers  have  told  me  that  their  daughters 
from  fourteen  to  sixteen  have  been  deter- 
mined to  walk  up  and  down  in  the  evening 
with  boys  of  their  own  age,  whom  the  moth- 
ers did  not  know. 

Here  is  where  the  line  should  be  drawn. 
A  schoolgirl  simply  cannot  have  friends  who 

157 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

are  not  welcome  in  her  father's  house,  and 
of  whom  her  mother  does  not  approve.  She 
may  not  write  letters  to  boy  friends  or  re- 
ceive letters  from  them  without  taking  her 
mother  into  her  confidence.  If  there  are  pic- 
nics, merry-makings,  evening  walks,  drives  or 
sails  by  moonlight,  it  is  all  right  if  a  group 
of  boys  and  girls  are  accompanied  by  an  older 
friend.  A  mother,  aunt  or  married  lady 
who  is  a  trusted  acquaintance  must  take 
charge  of  such  a  party.  Above  all,  a  girl 
must  have  her  life  and  conduct  an  open  book 
for  her  family  to  read.  She  cannot  have  se- 
crets and  reserves  from  her  mother.  This  is 
more  important  in  the  realm  of  her  friend- 
ship than  anywhere  else  in  the  whole  of  life's 
intercourse. 

A  question  worth  considering  for  each  of 
us  is,  what  do  I  mean  to  my  friends?  For 
what  do  I  stand? 

Girls  do  not  always  remember  that  it  is 

their  privilege  to  exert  a  good  influence  over 

the  boys  they  know.     A  girl  who  uses  slang 

and   permits   herself   to    be    rude   and   dis- 

158 


BOY  FRIENDS 


courteous  in  her  behavior  to  boys,  who  does 
not  exact  from  them  by  her  sweet  behavior 
something  that  is  like  homage  paid  to  an 
ideal,  misses  her  opportunity.  I  do  not  mean 
that  a  girl  should  be  self-conscious  or  a  prig, 
but  she  should  not  forget  that  she  is  in  a 
way  a  little  princess,  and  is  to  be  treated  ac- 
cordingly. 

Ethel  should  not  ask  Theodore  to  come 
and  see  her.  If  he  wishes  the  pleasure  of  a 
call  he  should  ask  and  she  should  grant,  and 
her  mother  should  be  present  at  least  during 
part  of  the  evening.  The  pleasant  and 
natural  way  for  very  young  people  is  to  visit 
in  the  family,  and  have  every  one  coming 
and  going  while  they  are  there. 

A  good  deal  of  pleasure  is  added  to  an 
ordinary  call  if,  before  it  is  over,  there  is 
something  to  eat.  Lemonade  and  cake  do 
not  come  amiss,  and  there  is  no  end  of  satis- 
faction in  an  old-fashioned  candy  pull  if  a 
half-dozen  boys  and  girls  take  part  in  it.  I 
have  yet  to  see  the  boy  who  does  not  like  to 
call  at  the  house  where  the  girls  invite  him 
159 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

to  help  them  make  fudge.  There  is  the 
more  fun  if  the  boys  help  to  clear  away  after 
the  feast. 

We  shall  never  do  our  friends  good  un- 
less we  are  ourselves  right-minded,  sincere 
and  unselfish.  There  is  not  the  least  use  in 
pretending  to  be  what  one  is  not.  Unless 
we  have  real  principles  and  care  about  living 
up  to  them,  we  shall  never  know  the  golden 
value  of  true  friendship.  Girls,  don't  for- 
get that  convictions  lived  up  to  make  strong 
characters. 

A  friend  is  not  afraid  to  tell  the  truth, 
though  now  and  then  it  may  wound  another. 
Still,  it  is  not  necessary  to  be  officious.  If  in 
your  presence  one  of  your  schoolmates,  boy 
or  girl,  should  say  something  unkind  about 
the  absent,  it  would  be  an  easy  thing  for  you 
to  show  your  displeasure.  You  would  not 
need  say  a  word;  a  look  would  be  enough. 
Sometimes  the  refusal  to  smile  at  a  jest  which 
takes  a  liberty  with  something  you  respect, 
or  a  grave  look  if  there  is  profanity  in  your 
presence,  will  put  an  end  to  it.  I  am  per- 
suaded that  the  habit  of  cigarette  smoking, 
1 60 


BOY  FRIENDS 


which  we  all  deplore  in  boys,  would  vanish 
from  the  face  of  the  earth  if  the  girls  would 
only  show  by  look  and  word  that  they  dis- 
approved of  it,  and  would  not  have  cigarette 
smokers  numbered  among  their  boy  friends. 

There  are  a  great  many  things  which  boys 
and  girls  may  do  together.  In  the  depart- 
ment of  nature  study  this  is  peculiarly  true. 
Excursions  to  study  birds  or  find  flowers,  in- 
volving tramps  through  the  fields,  or  moun- 
tain climbing,  are  doubly  pleasant  if  a  party 
of  young  people  go  in  company. 

To  add  zest  to  such  study  every  one  must 
be  enthusiastic.  There  is  no  room  for  the 
lad  who  is  bored  or  the  girl  who  lags  be- 
hind and  takes  little  interest.  Girls  are  as 
able  to  endure  fatigue  and  take  whatever 
comes  in  the  way  of  hardship  as  boys,  if  they 
are  properly  dressed  for  their  expeditions. 
Only  a  silly  girl  sets  out  for  a  mountain 
climb  or  walk  across  country  dressed  in  or- 
gandie or  lawn,  with  floating  ribbons,  with 
a  picture  hat  and  tight  shoes.  The  girl  who 
is  a  good  comrade  wears  loose,  easy  fitting 
costumes  for  out-of-doors,  has  no  floating 
161 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

tags  or  ends,  has  a  cap  or  a  sailor  hat,  and 
wears  shoes  with  broad  soles  and  low  heels 
properly  adjusted  to  her  feet. 

Tennis,  basket  ball  and  golf  are  games  that 
boys  and  girls  may  play,  with  no  odds  on 
either  side,  but  with  no  end  of  fun.  For  the 
rougher  games,  such  as  football  and  baseball 
girls  are  content  to  assume  the  role  of  spec- 
tators. They  know  the  points  of  the  game, 
and  their  sympathy  cheers  the  players,  while 
they  are  proud  to  wear  the  colors  of  those 
whom  they  favor. 

I  wish  I  could  make  you  see  friendship  as 
it  looks  to  me.  It  is  not  a  mere  pleasure  of 
the  moment.  It  is  not  enjoyment  only.  It 
is  a  chance  to  help  somebody  who  needs  help, 
a  chance  to  make  this  old  world  a  brighter 
place.  We  get  from  it  what  we  give.  If 
we  are  selfish  and  unwilling  to  make  a  sacri- 
fice, we  shall  never  be  friends  in  the  best  sense. 

Perhaps  I  can  illustrate  what  I  mean. 
You  have  just  seated  yourself  with  a  book 
that  you  have  been  trying  to  read,  and  for 
which  you  have  had  no  leisure.  You  have 
reached  the  most  exciting  part  of  the  story. 
162 


BOY  FRIENDS 


In  comes  your  brother  with  a  request  that  you 
will  mend  a  rip  in  his  glove,  or  in  walks  a 
neighbor  who  is  a  rather  dull  and  stupid 
boy.  It  is  a  test  of  your  amiability  and  al- 
truism, whether  you  care  more  for  your  own 
pleasure,  or  for  the  brother  and  the  broth- 
er's friend.  These  little  things,  mere  trifles 
apparently,  show  character.  Throughout 
life  there  are  chances  for  a  thousand  petty 
self-denials.  Some  of  them  make  the  dif- 
ference between  being  friendly  and  being 
selfish.  Friendship  never  thrives  in  the  soil 
of  selfishness. 


163 


CHAPTER  XXIII 
SCHOOLGIRLS'  CLUBS 

VT'OUR  mothers  and  sisters  and  all  your 
grown  up  friends  are  members  of  clubs. 
The  lady  who  has  never  belonged  to  a  club, 
never  attended  a  club  function,  and  never 
known  anything  about  the  pleasure  incidental 
to  study  and  work  in  a  literary,  or  social 
club,  is  so  exceptional  that  we  have  to  look 
for  her  with  a  microscope.  Every  town  and 
village  has  its  "  Mother's  Club,"  or  its  "  Four 
o'Clock  Club,"  or  its  "  Monday  Afternoon 
Club,"  or  its  club  with  the  name  of  one  of  the 
muses,  or  its  association  of  dames  and  daugh- 
ters, so  unless  the  girls  have  their  clubs,  too, 
they  will  really  be  rather  out  of  date. 

You  may  if  you  like,  have  a  club  just  as 
the  elders  have  and  for  much  the  same  pur- 
pose.    We  will  suppose  that  your  club  has 
for  its  object  nature  study.     The  birds,  the 
164 


SCHOOLGIRLS'  CLUBS 


flowers,  the  trees,  the  rocks  and  stones,  and 
everything  that  has  to  do  with  outdoor  life 
afford  interesting  subjects  for  those  who  study 
nature. 

If,  in  your  class  work,  you  have  taken  up 
zoology  and  botany,  a  club  for  nature  study 
will  help  along  by  way  of  supplementary  in- 
formation and  will  be  greatly  approved  by 
your  instructors.  You  will  have  certain 
days  for  meetings  and  certain  other  days  for 
long  and  pleasant  walks,  for  visiting  nature 
in  her  own  haunts,  watching  the  birds,  the 
butterflies  and  the  bees,  and  seeking  the  wild 
flowers  where  they  grow.  When  you  think 
of  it,  it  is  a  shame  that  we  should  live  in  a 
beautiful  world  with  so  much  that  is  fascinat- 
ing to  engage  our  powers,  and  yet  shut  our- 
selves up  within  the  bounds  of  four  walls  and 
know  so  little  as  we  do  about  nature's  won- 
derful works  and  ways. 

Your  club  may  be  organized  to  study  Eng- 
lish literature.  In  this  case  you  will  meet 
periodically,  arrange  a  course  of  reading,  and 
very  likely  write  papers  on  topics  assigned 
to  different  members.  I  am  not  sure  that 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

you  will  find  it  so  popular  a  club  as  one  that 
has  outdoor  life  for  its  motive.  Many  girls 
think  they  have  done  their  whole  duty  to 
themselves  and  each  other  when  their  school 
work  is  finished.  Yet  a  literature  club 
would  not  be  a  bad  idea,  and  in  it  there 
would  be  room  for  a  good  deal  of  what  might 
be  called  side  reading.  Your  knowledge  of 
books  and  authors  would  be  increased  in 
pleasant  readings  that  should  be  voluntary 
and  not  prescribed  by  professors  and  teachers. 
I  do  not  see  myself  any  objection  to  school- 
girls forming  a  club  purely  for  purposes  of 
fun  and  recreation.  You  have  so  much  hard 
work  in  school  and  at  home  that  you  are 
entitled  very  fairly  to  such  amusements  as 
you  like  and  such  pleasure  as  you  can  take 
in  company  with  one  another.  You  might 
have  a  Saturday  evening  club,  composed  of 
a  circle  of  congenial  girls  who  do  not  live 
too  far  apart  from  one  another  to  make 
meetings  early  on  Saturday  evenings  prac- 
ticable. Sometimes  you  might  assemble  at 
five  o'clock  and  have  supper  together  at  six, 
finishing  an  hour  or  two  afterward  with 
166 


SCHOOLGIRLS'  CLUBS 


games,  music  and  story-telling.  Or  you 
might  meet  at  seven  and  separate  at  nine. 
Have  a  program  arranged  beforehand  and 
conclude  with  refreshments.  You  might  oc- 
casionally have  a  candy  pull  or  make  fudge, 
and  once  a  month  your  brothers  might  be 
admitted  to  share  in  the  entertainment  of 
the  occasion.  On  the  whole  I  recommend 
this  idea  as  worth  carrying  out  provided  you 
can  gain  the  consent  and  approval  of  your 
mothers  and  any  other  powers  that  be. 

A  correspondence  club  affords  a  good  deal 
of  suggestion  and  satisfaction  to  its  members. 
I  knew  such  a  club  some  years  ago.  It  was 
composed  of  seven  girls  not  one  of  whom 
had  ever  seen  any  of  the  others.  They  made 
acquaintance  through  me  because  I  was  then 
writing  some  stories  for  girls  which  inter- 
ested each  of  these  widely  separated  cor- 
respondents. One  wrote  from  Brazil,  one 
from  Syria,  another  from  Bombay,  still  an- 
other from  Berlin,  and  the  remaining  three 
from  different  parts  of  the  United  States. 
The  seven  sent  me  their  letters  and  I  for- 
warded them  in  a  sort  of  round  robin  style, 
167 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

until  everyone  had  read  what  the  others 
wrote.  You  have  little  idea  of  the  amount 
of  information  and  of  fascinating  interest 
such  a  club  can  convey. 

A  girl's  club  does  not  require  much  red 
tape.  You  will  need  a  treasurer  if  you  have 
anything  for  which  money  will  be  required. 
If,  for  example,  your  club  does  any  work 
for  the  poor  or  engages  at  all  in  charity,  you 
must  have  small  weekly  or  monthly  dues,  and 
these  you  should  take  out  of  your  own  per- 
sonal allowance,  not  asking  your  parents  for 
them.  The  treasurer  must  keep  an  exact  ac- 
count of  what  she  receives  and  what  she  ex- 
pends, and  must  from  time  to  time  make  a 
report  to  her  club.  A  president  and  a  sec- 
retary are  the  only  other  necessary  officers. 

As  for  the  club's  name  it  may  be  whatever 
you  choose.  A  Latin  name  is  often  pre- 
ferred because  it  sounds  learned,  and  every- 
body is  not  supposed  to  know  what  it  means. 
An  alphabetical  name  is  attractive  because 
you  do  not  have  to  reveal  to  the  outside  pub- 
lic what  the  A.  B.  C.'s  or  the  X.  Y.  Z.'s 
stand  for.  If  you  choose  you  may  take  the 
168 


SCHOOLGIRLS'  CLUBS 


name  of  a  flower  and  be  known  by  that.  The 
pansy,  the  iris,  the  mignonette,  the  cosmos, 
the  violet,  are  appropriate  flowers  for  the 
christening  of  a  club.  When  you  select  a 
motto  let  it  be  something  inspiring  and  brief, 
some  line  of  poetry  or  apt  quotation,  some 
bit  of  wisdom  from  Shakespeare  or  Emer- 
son, that  will  be  a  sort  of  marching  order 
and  help  you  on  in  the  day's  work. 

Do  not  belong  to  a  club  at  all  unless  you 
are  willing  to  do  your  duty  as  a  member.  If 
you  undertake  any  obligation  in  this  world 
fulfill  it  with  conscience  and  punctuality.  It 
is  a  great  pity  for  any  of  us  to  grow  up 
shirking  responsibility.  We  have  each  a 
duty  to  all  the  others,  and  how  to  fulfill  this 
duty  is  one  of  the  things  we  learn  in  club 
life.  We  learn,  too,  to  yield  our  own  wishes 
and  work  agreeably  and  smoothly  with  other 
people.  No  better  lesson  does  a  club  teach 
than  just  this. 


169 


CHAPTER  XXIV 

COURAGE 

TT7HAT  was  that  you  said,  Dorothy? 
Am  I  sure  that  I  heard  you  aright? 
Are  you  really  afraid  of  a  little  gray  mouse 
that  you  could  hold  in  your  hand,  that  scut- 
tles away  from  you  in  terror  and  that,  meas- 
ured by  inches,  is  less  formidable  than  a  rab- 
bit or  a  squirrel? 

Yes,  you  own  it  without  a  blush.  You 
really  are  afraid  of  a  mouse.  So  are 
Frances,  Jane  and  ever  so  many  others  of 
your  friends. 

A  marked  aversion  to  the  entire  family 
of  rodents  is  a  pronounced  feature  of  most 
women  whether  they  are  little  or  large.  The 
little  woman  of  ten  screams  at  the  sight  of 
a  mouse  and  so  does  her  older  sister,  and 
very  likely  her  mother  and  her  grandmother 
are  equally  as  alarmed  at  the  appearance  of 
170 


COURAGE 


this  small  monster  which  is  indeed  a  beast 
of  prey,  but  such  a  wee  bit  of  a  beast,  not 
in  the  least  like  a  lion  or  a  tiger,  a  panther 
or  a  wolf.  Probably  the  dislike  to  mice  is 
natural  with  most  of  us  for  the  very  good 
reason  that  a  mouse  in  the  pantry  makes  dis- 
agreeable depredations,  and  apart  from  the 
toll  he  takes  is  anything  but  clean;  that  a 
mouse  in  the  bureau  drawer  nibbles  gloves 
and  eats  buttons  if  they  are  covered  with 
silk,  and  that  a  mouse  in  the  bedroom  any- 
way is  not  just  the  companion  one  would 
choose  at  the  midnight  hour. 

Mice  are  pretty  little  things  with  their  gray 
coats  and  their  bead-like  eyes,  but  they  be- 
long to  the  class  of  creatures  which  for  our 
own  preservation  we  must  fight.  I  am  not 
asking  my  girls  to  like  them,  but  for  pity's 
sake,  Dorothy,  do  overcome  your  terror  at 
their  mention.  A  mouse  has  never  yet  been 
known  to  devour  a  schoolgirl. 

I  wish  I  could  persuade  you  not  to  be 

afraid   of   anything,    great   or    small.     We 

must  take  certain  precautions.     To  walk  up 

as  some  fearless  girls  do  to  a  strange  dog, 

171 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

patting  him  on  the  head  and  trying  to  be 
friends  with  him  without  being  sure  that  their 
acquaintance  is  desired,  is  sometimes  danger- 
ous and  always  a  risk.  Dogs  are  the  dear- 
est friends  we  have  in  the  brute  creation. 
They  are  loyal  to  their  masters  and  they 
sometimes  seem  endowed  with  almost  human 
intelligence.  But  they  are  very  much  like 
men  and  women.  They  prefer  to  choose 
their  friends,  and  they  may  resent  approaches 
from  people  who  have  not  been  properly  in- 
troduced. Never  feel  or  show  apprehension 
when  you  meet  a  dog  that  is  quietly  going 
about  its  own  affairs,  but  do  not  be  familiar 
with  dog  or  cat  or  other  domestic  animal 
until  you  have  a  right  to  be  so  because  you 
have  entered  the  circle  of  its  friends. 

A  girl  who  is  afraid  of  any  animal,  from 
a  cow  in  the  pasture  to  a  mouse  in  the  wall 
carries  about  with  her  a  needless  handicap. 
We  should  go  about  the  world  bravely  and 
fearlessly.  I  have  seen  a  lady  in  a  drawing- 
room  make  a  spectacle  of  herself  in  the  pres- 
ence of  a  group  of  very  brilliant  and  distin- 
guished people  because  she  was  afraid  of  a 
172 


COURAGE 


cat.  In  walked  Muff,  the  splendid  angora, 
that  was  the  pet  of  the  hostess,  and  up  on 
a  sofa  with  a  shriek  and  a  scream  and  a 
clutching  and  gathering  of  her  skirts,  jumped 
a  lady  who  should  have  known  better  than 
to  behave  in  that  fashion  under  the  roof  of 
a  friend. 

One  rule  we  may  as  well  as  not  lay  down 
for  ourselves,  girls,  and  that  is  a  rule  of  self- 
control.  One  may  be  a  little  frightened  in- 
side, but  she  does  not  need  to  proclaim  it. 
Because  we  happen  to  dislike  bats,  beetles, 
June  bugs,  dragon  flies,  or  any  other  mem- 
bers of  the  wrorld  of  creeping  and  flying 
things  that  scurry  out  of  space  to  disturb  us, 
we  need  not  communicate  our  feeling  to 
others.  If  we  choose  we  may  control  all 
expression  of  dislike,  dismay  or  dread.  We 
may  sometimes  feel  afraid,  but  we  may  keep 
ourselves  from  showing  it. 

All  through  our  lives  we  should  try  not 
to  be  in  bondage  to  any  form  of  fear.  Some 
girls  cannot  bear  pain.  They  distress  them- 
selves more  in  the  thought  of  what  they  may 
have  to  suffer  from  a  slight  operation  or  an 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

injury,  than  the  pain  itself  would  amount 
to.  In  other  words,  they  suffer  more  from 
fright  than  from  reality.  Once  in  awhile 
one  meets  a  girl  almost  grown  up  who  is 
afraid  of  the  dark.  The  fear  of  the  dark  is 
a  tyranny  which  assails  children  who  have 
been  wickedly  alarmed  by  nurses  or  unscrupu- 
lous persons  and  who  fancy  that  dangers  of 
every  kind  lurk  behind  the  friendly  curtain  of 
the  night.  But  our  Heavenly  Father  sends 
this  kind  darkness  so  that  we  may  sleep  and 
rest  and  there  is  nothing  in  it  to  give  anyone 
the  slightest  fear.  The  stars  are  its  lamps 
and  the  moon  at  the  full  floods  it  with  a  glory 
as  great  as  that  of  the  sun.  While  we  sleep 
our  God  watches  above  us  and  His  angels 
are  our  guards. 

Another  thing  almost  as  foolish  as  the  fear 
of  the  mouse  is  the  fear  some  people  have 
of  taking  different  diseases.  In  case  of  an 
epidemic  such  as  diphtheria,  typhoid  fever  or 
cholera,  too  many  precautions  cannot  be 
taken,  and  if  one's  duty  is  not  on  the  scene 
of  action  it  is  well  to  go  to  a  safer  place. 

But    no    one    should    be    a    coward.     If 


COURAGE 


diseases  are  about  there  is  no  reason  to  sup- 
pose that  you  who  are  in  good  health  will 
necessarily  take  them.  To  be  constantly  dis- 
tressed lest  one  day  or  another  you  or  I  shall 
be  menaced  by  scarlet  fever,  or  smallpox,  is 
very  needless  and  quite  unfits  us  for  doing 
our  daily  work. 

This  courage  that  I  have  been  talking 
about  thus  far  is  purely  physical.  I  would 
not  like  any  girl  for  whom  I  cared  to  be 
afraid  to  cross  the  continent  or  the  ocean  be- 
cause something  might  happen  on  the  rail 
or  on  the  sea.  The  ship  is  the  captain's  busi- 
ness and  the  railway  train  is  in  charge  of  the 
conductor  and  engineer.  You  may  be  reason- 
ably sure  that  the  average  man  will  fulfill 
the  requirements  of  his  position  and  you  as 
a  passenger  have  nothing  to  do  except  to  en- 
joy yourself.  This,  too,  belongs  largely  to 
the  realm  of  physical  courage. 

Now  I  want  to  speak  about  a  higher  kind 
of  courage.  There  are  brave  people  who 
never  shrink  from  danger  that  menaces  the 
body,  but  who  are  moral  cowards.  They 
are  afraid  to  speak  the  truth  if  the  truth  will 

175 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

injure  themselves.  They  arc  afraid  to  en- 
dure anxiety  about  their  loved  ones.  They 
hide  from  their  own  eyes  things  they  do  not 
want  to  see.  Whatever  else  one  may  be, 
one  should  try  very  hard  to  be  morally  brave. 
At  any  cost,  be  true  and  noble.  Let  me 
quote  for  you  Charles  Kingsley's  stanza 
which  every  girl  should  know  by  heart : 

"  Be  good,  sweet  maid,  and  let  who  will  be  clever, 
Do  noble  things,  not  dream  them  all  day  long. 

And  so  make  life,  love  and  the  great  forever 
One  grand,  sweet  song." 


176 


CHAPTER  XXV 

REPOSE 

T  DOUBT  very  much  whether  girls  be- 
•*•  tween  thirteen  and  sixteen  ever  appre- 
ciate the  importance  of  knowing  how  to  sit 
still.  This  is  one  of  the  lessons  we  learn  at 
school,  and  it  is  fully  as  valuable  as  any 
lesson  in  science  or  literature,  or  any  other 
department  in  which  we  are  instructed. 
Girls  are  often  fidgety,  jumping  up  and  rush- 
ing about  when  there  is  no  need  for  restless 
activity,  and  changing  their  posture  until 
looking  at  them  is  fatiguing  to  other  people. 
Unless  we  learn  how  to  sit  still  when  we  are 
young,  we  seldom  master  the  art  successfully 
when  we  are  older. 

I  can  think  of  a  famous  man  whose  name 

is  honored  wherever  it  is  heard.     He  has  one 

fault  of  manner  that  he  has  never  overcome; 

he  cannot  sit  still.     In  a  drawing-room  he 

177 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

wriggles  and  fidgets  and  actually  when  ex- 
cited bounces  up  and  down  like  a  ball,  and 
wise  hostesses  invariably  take  the  precaution 
to  seat  him  in  their  strongest  chairs.  In 
church  he  slips  down  in  front  of  the  pew, 
leans  his  head  on  the  railing,  contorts  him- 
self in  queer  fashion,  and  furnishes  enter- 
tainment for  his  neighbors  and  annoyance  to 
the  minister.  All  this  could  have  been  al- 
tered had  anybody  taken  pains  to  teach  the 
man  how  to  sit  still  in  his  boyhood. 

One  of  the  most  charming  things  in  girl- 
hood is  serenity.  It  would  pay  a  father 
should  he  spend  much  money  in  having  his 
pretty  daughter  taught  outward  repose. 

"How  can  I  be  calm  and  placid?"  asks 
Josephine,  "  when  I  am  bubbling  up  and 
effervescent  inside?  How  can  I  look  tran- 
quil when  I  am  angry  and  disturbed?  " 

The  questions  are  well  put,  although  they 
touch  opposite  aspects  of  the  case.  It  is 
natural  that  girls  should  be  bubbling  up  with 
gaiety  and  high  spirits.  A  dull,  stupid  girl, 
who  has  no  fun  in  her  and  who  does  not  care 
about  good  times  is  so  exceptional  that  we 
178 


REPOSE 

are  sure  she  is  ill  and,  if  we  are  sensible, 
send  for  the  doctor  to  look  her  over  and 
tell  us  what  to  do.  But  one  may  be  bright 
and  cheerful,  may  laugh  and  be  merry,  and 
yet  be  so  self-restrained  that  she  will  not  let 
her  fun  break  in  upon  the  quiet  of  her  friends, 
or  so  far  forget  herself  as  to  force  it  upon 
them,  if  they  are  in  a  different  mood.  A 
girl  who  has  learned  to  sit  still  controls  her 
fun  just  as  she  does  every  other  act  and  state 
of  body  and  mind. 

As  to  being  angry  and  disturbed,  I  must 
say  plainly  that  such  tempers  in  girlhood  are 
very  unwholesome.  Anger  in  most  circum- 
stances is  a  foe  to  health  and  happiness,  and 
is  like  a  snake  in  the  grass  or  an  enemy  within 
the  gates  in  its  effect  upon  character.  Very 
few  people  can  afford  to  indulge  anger.  It 
is  the  most  poisonous  and  upsetting  of  pas- 
sions, and  leads  to  no  end  of  misery.  Neither 
should  a  girl  let  herself  be  disturbed  when 
things  go  a  little  wrong.  They  are  bound 
to  go  wrong  now  and  then,  and  when  they 
do  we  must  be  philosophical  and  make  the 
best  of  it.  You  remember  Charles  Dickens 
179 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

and  his  "  Five-and-Twenty  Tattycorum." 
The  absurd  name  belonged  to  a  charity  child, 
who  lived  in  the  house  of  a  philosopher,  and 
when  she  threw  herself  into  a  fit  of  frenzy, 
as  she  sometimes  did,  the  good  man  told  her 
to  count  five  and  twenty  before  she  said  a 
single  word.  Some  of  us  would  have  to 
count  five  and  twenty  several  times  before 
we  had  quite  conquered  our  vexation,  espe- 
cially if  we  had  never  learned  how  to  wait 
and  be  patient.  The  wise  man  said  in  the 
Proverbs,  "  Better  is  he  that  ruleth  his  spirit 
than  he  that  taketh  a  city,"  and  no  truer 
word  was  ever  spoken. 

One  advantage  given  to  boys  who  are 
taught  military  tactics  is  found  in  the  con- 
trol they  gain  over  their  muscles,  and  the 
flexibility  and  poise  that  comes  through 
movement  in  harmony  with  rhythm  and  law. 
An  equal  advantage  would  be  gained  should 
girls  and  boys -practice  sitting  still.  As,  how- 
ever, we  hardly  expect  so  much  repose  in  the 
brothers  as  in  the  sisters,  the  latter  must  try 
to  set  the  finer  examples. 

In  the  art  of  sitting  still  may  be  compre- 
180 


REPOSE 

hended  the  low  tone  that  is  so  delightful  a 
thing  in  speech,  and  the  gentle  courtesy  that 
robs  life  of  friction.  I  am  constantly  hear- 
ing people  say  that  they  are  too  busy  to  do 
this  or  the  other  thing,  that  they  are  so  hur- 
ried that  they  cannot  get  through  the  day's 
tasks,  and  that  they  are  tired  before  the  day 
begins  with  the  mere  thinking  of  what  they 
have  to  do. 

Hurry  has  intruded  into  the  air  we  breathe, 
and  we  go  whirling  through  the  world  as 
if  we  were  horses  on  a  race  track.  When 
a  ferryboat  is  about  to  arrive  at  the  dock, 
or  a  train  approaches  the  station,  the  pas- 
sengers spring  to  their  feet  and  hasten  out 
pellmell,  as  if  life  depended  on  their  crowd- 
ing out  together  and  not  losing  an  instant's 
time.  As  a  nation  we  are  all  marching  on 
the  double-quick.  It  is  fortunate  for  school- 
girls that  they  are  obliged  to  enter  and  leave 
class  rooms  with  order  and  moderation.  The 
good  habit  thus  formed  may  stand  them  in 
stead  by-and-by.  A  good  deal  of  illness, 
headache,  and  nervousness  would  be  saved 
if  only  we  could  take  our  time,  wait  a  little, 
181 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

be  considerate  and  win  what  a  clever  author 
has  called  "  power  through  repose." 

When  I  was  a  schoolgirl  I  had  two  inti- 
mate friends,  one  of  whom  was  very  beauti- 
ful and  very  mercurial,  with  as  many  changes 
in  her  face  as  an  April  sky.  Every  passing 
emotion  brought  its  corresponding  facial 
gesture.  She  was  never  the  same  for  two 
minutes.  When  she  was  talking  her  whole 
face  seemed  alive  with  movement.  The 
other  girl  was  quiet  and  dignified,  not  so  re- 
sponsive to  every  breeze  as  her  companion. 
Yet,  nevertheless,  she  was  sympathetic  and 
charming.  She  was  a  rather  plain  girl.  No 
one  thought  of  her  as  having  any  claim  to 
beauty.  Twenty  years  after  we  had  all  left 
school  the  first  girl  had  grown  thin,  angular 
and  homely;  her  brow  had  lines  that  ought 
not  to  have  been  there,  and  her  eager  eyes 
flamed  in  a  hollow  face.  The  other  was  by 
this  time  beautiful.  She  had  gained  some- 
thing lovely  from  every  year  that  had  gone 
over  her  head.  She  had  known  how  to  sit 
still  and  let  the  repose  of  her  spirit  illuminate 
her  countenance. 

182 


CHAPTER  XXVI 

TACT 

5  OUISE,  who  is  a  girl  neighbor,  came 
into  my  living-room  the  other  day  look- 
ing very  forlorn.  She  flung  herself  into  a 
chair,  the  corners  of  her  mouth  drooped  and 
I  saw  that  tears  were  not  very  far  from  her 
honest  brown  eyes.  Louise  has  those  big 
brown  eyes  that  show  a  soul  so  true  and  loyal 
that  it  has  in  it  not  the  faintest  possibility 
for  deceit. 

"  What  is  the  matter?  "  I  said.  "  Have 
you  found  out  that  your  doll  is  stuffed  with 
sawdust,  or  has  your  dearest  friend  picked 
up  her  playthings  and  gone  home  ?  You  ap- 
pear to  have  met  with  some  provoking  dis- 
appointment. Did  you  not  get  on  the  pro- 
motion list  after  all  your  work?  Come, 
dear,  pour  out  your  trouble.  Tell  me  what 
183 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

has  happened.  Perhaps  I  can  help  you.  I 
have  been  in  hard  places  myself." 

Louise  managed  to  smile  a  little  as  she 
answered:  '  The  trouble  isn't  one  that  you 
can  cure.  It  is  just  that  I  am  such  an  idiot 
of  a  girl,  always  saying  the  wrong  thing  and 
making  mistakes  and  setting  people  against 
me.  I  have  done  it  three  times  to-day;  I 
have  three  times  said  the  wrong  thing,  and 
I  am  completely  discouraged. 

"  In  the  first  place  I  met  Mena  Carson 
on  her  way  to  school  this  morning.  She  was 
in  very  good  spirits  and  told  me  that  she 
was  sure  she  would  have  a  perfect  recitation 
in  geometry  as  she  had  worked  out  every 
proposition  correctly  last  evening.  I  had 
nothing  better  to  answer  than :  '  That  will 
be  a  change  for  you.  I  know  that  your 
Cousin  Tom  is  visiting  your  house,  and  I 
suppose  he  helped  you.' 

"  Now,  that  was  the  worst  and  most  in- 
sulting remark  I  could  have  made,  for  Mena 
is  very  dull  in  mathematics,  and,  as  every- 
body knows,  her  people  at  home  are  not  par- 
ticularly well  educated.  I  called  attention  in 
184 


TACT 

a  breath  to  her  own  stupidity  and  to  the 
fact  that  she  could  not  have  made  her  prepa- 
ration unless  Tom  Winthrop  had  been  there 
to  help  her.  She  left  me  abruptly,  and  she 
has  not  spoken  to  me  since.  Anyway,  I  was 
sincere." 

"  Yes,  Louise,"  I  assured  her,  "  you  were 
sincere,  but  you  were  not  tactful.  I  fear  that 
you  did  hurt  your  friend's  feelings  quite 
needlessly.  Go  on,  dear.  Let  me  hear  the 
rest." 

"  At  recess,"  said  Louise,  "  Marjorie 
Dean  asked  me  if  I  liked  the  fashion  of  her 
new  frock.  Without  stopping  to  think,  I 
told  her  frankly  that  the  fashion  was  pretty 
enough  for  some  people.  It  would  suit  a 
tall,  slender  girl  like  Nancy  Kent,  but  it 
made  Marjorie  look  too  dumpy  and  short. 
It  was  the  truth,  but  Marjorie  flushed  up 
and  said :  '  You  do  say  such  horrid  things, 
Louise.  One  never  knows  what  you  will  tell 
her  when  she  asks  you  a  civil  question.' 
Then  she  walked  off,  and  I  know  she  does 
not  like  her  frock  so  well  as  she  did  before. 

"  As  if  this  were  not  sufficient,"  Louise 
185 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

proceeded,  "  I  blundered  again.  Miss  Til- 
son,  our  teacher,  asked  me  whether  I  would 
have  to  go  out  of  my  way  to  post  a  letter 
for  her,  when  I  went  home  to  luncheon. 
The  post  office  is  three  blocks  .from  our 
house  in  an  opposite  direction  from  the 
school,  so  I  could  not  oblige  my  teacher  with- 
out taking  some  extra  steps.  I  hesitated  a 
moment  before  I  answered :  '  I  shall  have 
to  go  a  little  out  of  the  way,  but  I  can  hurry, 
and  I  will  be  happy  to  post  your  letter.' 
*  Never  mind,'  said  Miss  Tilson,  '  here  comes 
Rose  Elliot,  I  think  she  can  oblige  me  with- 
out any  inconvenience.' 

"  You  should  have  seen  Rose.  She  just 
beamed.  She  seized  upon  that  letter  and 
bore  it  off  in  triumph,  and  Miss  Tilson 
looked  after  her  as  much  as  to  say:  '  There 
goes  a  young  girl  who  takes  delight  in  doing 
favors  for  people.'  ' 

Louise  sighed  and  was  silent. 

"  The  error  you  make,  Louise,"  I  said, 

after  a  pause,  "  is  a  common  one  with  young 

people.     They  lack  a  sense  of  proportion. 

You  are  naturally  candid  and  open,  and  you 

186 


TACT 

have  formed  an  excellent  habit  of  always 
telling  the  truth.  I  like  your  sincerity.  I 
even  like  your  bluntness,  and  yet  I  must  tell 
you  very  plainly  that  sincerity  without  tact 
is  often  cruel  and  brutal,  and  sometimes  un- 
pardonable. Tact  means  touch. 

"  The  tactful  girl  is  very  quick  to  under- 
stand a  situation.  She  knows  how  people  feel 
without  having  their  sentiments  explained. 
She  never  goes  out  of  her  way  to  show 
a  schoolmate  as  you  did  Mena,  that  you 
have  noticed  how  frequently  she  is  deficient. 
In  no  circumstances  does  she  venture  to  in- 
form an  acquaintance  that  her  hat  or  dress 
is  unbecoming,  when  the  dress  and  hat  have 
been  bought  and  paid  for.  And  she  under- 
stands how  to  undertake  a  commission  with- 
out actually  saying  that  it  will  put  her  to 
some  inconvenience.  This  morning  you  had 
only  to  say  to  Mena,  when  she  told  you  about 
the  geometry:  '  Dear  Mena,  how  glad  I 
am,'  and  you  might  have  stopped  your  com- 
ment on  Marjorie's  frock  at  the  point  of 
admiration  for  the  fashion.  As  for  Miss 
Tilson  you  had  merely  to  say:  'Why  of 
187 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

course;  it  will  be  a  pleasure  to  post  your 
letter.' 

"  One  of  our  greatest  perils  is  in  this  direc- 
tion. We  exalt  one  virtue  at  the  expense  of 
another.  I  had  a  schoolmate  who  not  only 
never  made  friends,  but  really  made  enemies 
through  her  determination  never  to  say  the 
least  thing  that  was  not  altogether  true.  She 
carried  her  truth-telling  so  far  that  she  con- 
stantly involved  other  people  in  trouble  by 
doing  what  has  been  regarded  by  school  peo- 
ple as  shocking  from  the  days  of  the  Romans 
until  now.  She  was  a  sort  of  tale-bearer, 
not  because  she  wanted  to  be  so,  but  because 
her  conscience  obliged  her  to  reveal  every- 
thing she  knew,  whether  it  was  her  own  af- 
fair or  that  of  another." 

At  this  Louise  sat  up  very  straight. 
"  That  girl,"  she  said,  "  was  a  goose. 
Everybody  knows  that  telling  tales  is  per- 
fectly abominable." 

"  I  agree  with  you  in  that,  but  Caroline 
unfortunately    never    learned    that     simple 
thing;  in  consequence  she  was  shunned  as  a 
girl  and  disliked  when  she  grew  older. 
1*8 


TACT 

"  A  very  important  study  for  girls,  as  im- 
portant, I  think,  as  Latin,  algebra  or  Ger- 
man, is  to  learn  how  to  be  both  tactful  and 
sincere.  We  must  never  knowingly  violate 
the  truth,  but  there  are  times  when  we  may 
be  silent  and  commit  no  sin.  A  lie  may  be 
told  by  one  who  is  a  hypocrite,  without  her 
opening  her  lips.  There  are  times  when  de- 
ception is  carried  on  by  looks.  One  must 
speak  truth  if  she  speaks  at  all,  and  one  must 
not  be  a  coward.  A  sincere  nature  reveals 
itself  in  tones  and  glances,  as  well  as  in 
speech,  but  one  who  is  tactful  will  learn 
delicacy.  She  will  be  careful  not  to  wound 
anyone's  feelings.  She  will  refrain  from 
putting  herself  forward  and  will  be  quick  to 
do  and  say  agreeable  things. 

"  For  instance,  your  friend  Marjorie  has 
a  beautiful  complexion.  You  might  have 
said  '  that  color  suits  your  hair  and  eyes,' 
without  calling  attention  to  her  figure.  Al- 
though Mena  is  not  quick  at  mathematics, 
she  writes  good  compositions,  and  I  don't  be- 
lieve you  have  ever  complimented  her  on  that 
talent.  As  for  Miss  Tilson,  whom  you 
189 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

adore,  you  can  make  it  all  right  with  her  by 
being  on  the  watch  to  accommodate  her  next 
time.  Does  she  not  let  the  girls  sometimes 
make  her  a  cup  of  tea  at  the  noon  hour? 
And  do  you  not  sometimes  carry  your  lunch- 
eon with  you  to  school?  The  tactful  per- 
son looks  out  for  opportunities  to  be  helpful, 
without  ever  being  obtrusive. 

'*  Cheer  up,  Louise,  you  have  done  noth- 
ing very  dreadful  after  all.  Nine-tenths  of 
the  difficulty  is  in  finding  out  where  our  weak 
points  lie.  Once  they  are  discovered,  it  is 
very  easy  to  guard  against  them.  I  expect 
to  see  you  as  tactful  as  your  sister  Genevieve 
by  the  time  you  are  twenty." 


190 


CHAPTER  XXVII 

A    GRACIOUS    MANNER 

T  WONDER  if  you  girls  have  ever  thought 
how  much  depends  in  this  world  on  a 
good  manner.  I  am  not  exactly  talking 
about  manners,  for  I  can  think  of  several 
people  whose  manners  are  not  at  all  rude  or 
boorish,  who  are  quite  punctilious  about  be- 
ing polite,  and  who  yet  are  often  at  a  dis- 
advantage. Their  whole  effect  is  spoiled  by 
something  hard  to  define. 

In  the  first  place,  one's  manner  is  really 
one's  self.  It  should  fit  like  a  glove,  or  like 
a  dress  that  is  made  by  somebody  who  knows 
just  how  to  give  the  best  cut  and  the  most 
graceful  style. 

Secondly,  note  that  manner  is  personality, 

and  personality  makes  the  difference  between 

grace  and  clumsiness,  between  sincerity  and 

affectation.     Far  more  than  you  may  think, 

191 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

your  success  in  life,  your  ability  to  carry  out 
what  you  undertake,  depend  on  your  possess- 
ing an  attractive  manner.  The  best  man- 
ner springs  from  the  best  and  truest  heart. 
A  manner  that  sets  others  at  their  ease  and 
keeps  them  from  feeling  awkward  and  out  of 
place  is  sure  to  be  good.  A  manner  that 
for  a  single  instant  and  for  any  cause  what- 
ever makes  another  person  uncomfortable  is 
sure  to  be  a  bad  manner.  You  cannot  put 
on  a  manner  and  take  it  off,  as  you  put  on 
and  take  off  a  party  frock.  Your  manner  is 
you,  and  whatever  else  you  do  you  can  never 
get  away  from  being  yourself. 

A  person  who  has  had  kind  thoughts  and 
unselfish  ways  all  her  life,  who  has  never  been 
proud  and  conceited,  or  haughty  and  vain, 
who  has  never  looked  down  on  anybody  or 
fancied  that  somebody  else  was  not  fit  to  be 
noticed,  will  be  very  likely  to  have  a  good 
manner,  and  good  manners,  too. 

Now  that  I  have  said  this,  I  want  to  speak 
of  a  few  points.  One  concerns  your  be- 
havior in  public  places.  There  is  no  par- 
ticular harm  in  giggling  and  laughing  im- 
192 


A  GRACIOUS  MANNER 

moderately  when  a  group  of  girls  are  by 
themselves,  and  see  something  funny  that 
quite  upsets  them.  But  a  car  in  which  you 
are  coming  home  from  school,  or  the  street 
on  which  you  are  walking  with  other  people, 
or  the  ferryboat,  is  not  the  place  for  boister- 
ous mirth.  Really  well-bred  girls  are  rather 
quiet  in  such  places,  and  remember  that  they 
are  not  the  only  people  on  the  road,  and  are 
very  careful  not  to  do  or  say  anything  which 
will  make  them  conspicuous.  This  is  point 
number  one. 

If  you  go  to  a  matinee  and  there  are  peo- 
ple around  you  who  wish  to  enjoy  the  opera 
or  the  play,  it  is  to  the  last  degree  improper 
for  girls  to  whisper  and  chat  and  carry  on 
conversations  of  their  own  to  the  annoyance 
of  those  about  them.  Equally,  no  matter 
how  dainty  and  becoming  your  picture  hat 
may  be,  good  manners  will  lead  you  to  re- 
move it  and  hold  it  in  your  lap,  if  in  a  place 
of  amusement  it  interfere  with  the  view  of 
somebody  behind  you.  I  once  heard  a  lady 
ask  a  young  girl  to  remove  her  hat.  The 
girl  turned  with  a  frown,  which  very  much 
193 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

disfigured  a  pretty  face,  and  said  firmly :  "  I 
shall  keep  my  hat  on."  This  leads  me  to 
still  another  point. 

Thoughtless  girls  sometimes  pride  them- 
selves on  being  very  candid.  They  tell  you, 
with  quite  an  air  as  if  they  were  saying  some- 
thing fine:  "  I  never  hesitate  to  speak  out 
and  say  exactly  what  I  mean.  I  don't  care 
to  whom  I  am  talking.  I  just  tell  the  whole 
truth."  None  of  us  are  excusable  for  tell- 
ing what  is  not  true.  But  there  are  times 
when  silence  is  better  than  speech,  and  when 
we  have  no  business  whatever  to  tell  either 
the  whole  truth  or  even  a  little  bit  of  it. 
Sometimes  we  may  have  reserves.  And  a 
lie  may  be  told  by  a  cowardly  silence.  All 
depends  on  the  occasion.  If  your  Aunt 
Mary  has  just  bought  an  expensive  green 
cloth  for  her  next  season's  gown  it  is  not 
your  duty  to  inform  her  that  green  does  not 
suit  her  complexion,  or  that  it  is  less  fashion- 
able than  blue.  Let  her  enjoy  her  purchase. 
You  were  not  asked  for  advice,  and  it  is  the 
worst  thing  in  the  world,  so  far  as  manners 
194 


A  GRACIOUS  MANNER 

are  involved,  to  go  about  giving  advice  to 
people  who  do  not  seek  it. 

Deference  to  those  who  are  older  than 
yourself   is  another  little  point   in   manners 

t  which  cannot  be  overlooked.  No  matter 
how  unreasonable,  trying  or  disagreeable  an 
old  lady  or  an  old  gentleman  may  be,  just 
because  of  the  burden  of  years  which  he  or 
she  is  carrying,  remember  to  be  patient, 
courteous  and  not  contradictory.  Never 
brusquely  contradict  anybody;  above  all  any- 
body who  is  old.  If  you  live  long  enough 
you,  too,  will  be  old.  It  seems  impossible  that 
dancing  feet  should  ever  totter  or  brown  hair 
ever  turn  white  or  rounded  cheeks  grow  hol- 
low, but  Time  is  a  thief,  and  he  steals  away 
youth  and  substitutes  age  before  we  know 
it.  So  please,  whatever  else  you  do,  be  po- 
lite and  considerate  to  those  who  are  old. 

Girls  with  very  sweet  manners  always  rise 
when  older  people  enter  a  room.  I  don't  in- 
sist upon  this,  but  I  just  whisper  that  a  girl 
who  does  it  shows  extremely  good  training. 
One,  of  course,  knows  that  a  boy  will  rise 
195 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

when  a  lady  enters  a  room,  but  it  is  just  as 
pretty  a  rule  for  a  girl. 

About  borrowing  books  and  umbrellas  and 
fans  and  any  other  thing  you  happen  to  want, 
from  a  schoolmate,  observe  that  good  man- 
ners require  you  to  return  them  promptly. 
Should  you  be  obliged  to  ask  the  loan  of  a 
little  change  for  car  fare  or  a  church  col- 
lection, or  some  unexpected  emergency,  do 
not  delay  payment,  but  take  trouble  to  re- 
turn the  amount  on  the  first  opportunity. 

In  the  family  two  persons  should  not  be 
reading  the  same  book  at  the  same  time.  If 
Belle  has  the  prior  claim  on  the  book  that 
has  come  from  the  library  let  her  finish  it 
before  Clara  begins. 

In  some  houses  certain  chairs,  certain 
corners  of  the  room  and  certain  seats  at  the 
table,  by  a  kind  of  unwritten  law,  are  the 
property  of  this  or  the  other  person.  Do 
not  seat  yourself  complacently  in  that  corner 
of  the  sofa  where  your  grandfather  has  read 
his  morning  paper  for  the  last  twenty  years. 

Respect  the  rights  of  everybody.  By  no 
196 


A  GRACIOUS  MANNER 

means  look  over  the  paper  that  your  neigh- 
bor is  reading  in  a  street  car.  Do  not  in- 
terrupt conversation,  and  if  a  friend  hesitates 
for  a  word  wait  with  patience  until  she  finds 
it.  The  word  will  come  to  her,  never  fear, 
if  you  do  not  hurry  to  supply  it. 

Try  to  remember  people's  names.  A 
habit  of  courteous  attention  when  meeting 
strangers  will  serve  you  well  all  your  life. 
Be  ready  with  little  services  to  those  about 
you,  but  do  not  be  intrusive.  The  golden 
virtue  in  manners  is  tact,  and  tact  simply 
means  being  in  touch  and  in  sympathy  with 
others,  and  not  being  absorbed  in  one's  self. 

It  is  never  worth  while  to  be  too  exact 
with  reference  to  other  people's  stories. 
Some  girls  never  fail  to  set  their  mothers 
right  when  the  latter  are  relating  a  little  do- 
mestic occurrence.  Unless  there  is  a  good 
reason  for  stating  the  fact  that  Uncle  John 
stopped  on  Thursday,  do  not  set  your  mother 
right  if  you  hear  her  tell  a  neighbor  that  he 
called  on  Friday.  If  you  wish  to  correct 
any  story  that  anybody  tells,  watch  for  a 
197 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

chance  and  do  it  in  private.  On  the  whole, 
as  I  said  when  I  began,  a  good  manner 
springs  from  a  good  heart,  and  fine  manners 
are  the  outcome  of  unselfish  kindness. 


198 


CHAPTER  XXVIII 

THE   SWEET-VOICED  GIRL 

/"\NE  of  the  prettiest  sights  in  the  world  is 
V^  that  of  the  young  people  on  their  way 
to  school  between  eight  and  nine  in  the  morn- 
ing. I  like  to  see  the  girls  as  they  go  arm 
in  arm,  each  with  her  pile  of  books  in  her 
hands,  chatting  gayly  or  talking  confiden- 
tially, their  day  before  them  and  not  a  cloud 
to  dim  their  sky.^ 

"  What  a  sweet  voice  that  girl  has,"  I 
heard  some  one  say  as  Elizabeth  ran  across 
the  street  to  meet  Emily,  calling  out  her 
cheery  good  morning.  It  was  indeed  a  sweet 
voice  and  had  carrying  power,  clear  as  a  bell 
or  a  bird  note,  yet  it  was  not  loud.  Voices 
are  as  different  as  faces.  We  pay  a  great 
deal  of  attention  in  this  country  to  training 
the  singing  voice,  and  we  are  willing  to  pay 
teachers  large  prices  to  develop  the  fine  so- 
199 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

prano  or  the  rich  contralto  that  everyone  ad- 
mires. But  far  too  little  trouble  is  taken 
with  the  speaking  voice,  and  it  is  a  pity,  for 
we  sing  only  occasionally,  and  most  of  us 
talk  from  morning  till  night. 

If  you  hear  a  group  of  girls  talking  on 
the  campus  or  in  a  street  car,  you  are  often 
pained  by  the  lack  of  melody  in  their  voices. 
Some  are  harsh  and  rough,  others  are  nasal; 
some  are  muffled  and  croaking;  a  few  are 
pure  and  silvery.  Shakespeare,  who  was  an 
acute  observer,  in  speaking  of  one  of  his  hero- 
ines, said:  "  Her  voice  was  ever  soft,  gentle 
and  low;  an  excellent  thing  in  woman." 
First  and  last  you  find  a  good  many  allusions 
to  voices  in  Shakespeare.  There  are  families 
in  which  each  seems  to  try  whether  or  not  he 
or  she  can  be  heard  by  speaking  so  loudly 
as  to  drown  the  rest.  This  is  always  a  mark 
of  very  ill-breeding.  No  well-bred  person 
screams  or  shouts  in  the  family  or  anywhere 
else.  A  low  voice  may  be  heard  quite  as 
effectively  as  one  that  is  loud  and  shrill,  if 
its  possessor  has  learned  the  art  of  managing 
it  properly.  Even  in  a  large  building  a  per- 
200 


THE  SWEET-VOICED  GIRL 

son  who  speaks  slowly,  giving  every  word  its 
full  value,  and  throwing  the  voice  from  the 
chest  instead  of  from  the  head,  will  be  heard 
distinctly. 

In  order  to  have  a  full,  agreeable  voice, 
a  girl  should  practice  deep  breathing  several 
times  a  day  in  the  open  air.  The  voice  is 
the  expression  of  health,  strength,  character 
and  personality.  The  lips,  the  teeth,  the 
roof  of  the  mouth,  the  palate,  the  vocal 
cords  and  the  lungs  are  all  involved  in  this 
voice  of  ours,  which  is  our  peculiar  endow- 
ment, and  lifts  us  up  to  the  highest  plane 
in  creation. 

I  will  suppose  that  some  girl  for  whom  I 
am  writing  has  contracted  a  slovenly  way  of 
talking,  that  her  voice  is  not  pleasant,  and 
that  her  enunciation  is  indistinct.  How  shall 
she  break  herself  of  these  bad  habits?  Just 
as  she  would  break  herself  of  a  bad  habit  in 
any  other  direction,  she  must  set  herself  to 
work  about  this  and  be  in  downright  earnest 
if  she  is  to  accomplish  anything  worth  while. 
She  must  remind  herself  constantly  if  she  is 
accustomed  to  shriek,  that  people  around  her 
20 1 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

are  not  deaf,  and  that  if  they  were  they  would 
hear  her  as  easily  if  she  spoke  low  as  if  she 
spoke  loudly.  Every  time  she  begins  speak- 
ing as  if  she  were  a  soldier  on  the  warpath, 
let  her  call  a  halt,  and  drop  her  voice  a  tone 
or  two.  •  If  she  has  the  heedless  method  of 
omitting  the  final  g  and  saying  "  mornin'  ' 
for  morning  and  "  evenin'  "  for  evening,  let 
her  remedy  that.  If  she  run  her  words  to- 
gether, as  too  many  of  us  do  under  the  im- 
pression that  there  is  no  time  to  spare,  and 
that  words  must  tumble  over  each  other  as 
water  tumbles  over  rocks,  let  her  pause  and 
go  more  slowly. 

Two  girls  the  other  day  were  discussing 
a  third  who  was  a  student  in  a  New  England 
college,  but  was  a  native  of  India;  a  high 
caste  girl  who  had  been  taught  English  in 
her  babyhood.  "  You  should  hear  her  per- 
fect English,"  one  said  to  the  other.  "  She 
speaks  more  slowly  than  we  do,  and  her  voice 
is  like  music.  She  is  never  the  least  in  a 
hurry  and  there  is  the  prettiest  little  accent 
like  a  fragrance."  We  often  notice  this 
crystalline  perfection  in  foreigners  who  have 
202 


THE  SWEET-VOICED  GIRL 

acquired  English  and  speak  it  less  recklessly 
and  with  more  precision  than  we  who  are 
to  the  manner  born.  Dear  girls,  take  your 
time.  There  is  plenty  of  it.  Neither  rush 
nor  shout,  nor  cackle,  nor  make  a  shrill 
clamor  when  you  are  talking,  but  remember 
Shakespeare's  low  and  gentle  voice,  which  is 
an  excellent  thing  in  woman. 

Of  course,  no  girl  who  respects  herself 
ever  fumes,  frets  or  scolds.  There  is  a 
scolding  voice  and  there  is  a  fretting  voice, 
and  both  are  most  repellent.  Fancy  coming 
suddenly  into  the  presence  of  a  girl  whom 
you  have  always  thought  lovely  and  attrac- 
tive, and  finding  her  storming  and  using  in- 
vectives, and  finding  fault  in  a  coarse,  hateful 
way;  that  would  show  you  that  her  char- 
acter had  a  very  seamy  side.  You  could 
never  have  the  same  opinion  of  such  a  girl 
again.  It  would  be  as  if  under  the  fair  out- 
side you  had  seen  a  glimpse  of  something 
dark  and  repulsive  within.  Probably  few 
girls  offend  by  passionate  vehemence  of  this 
kind,  yet  now  and  then  one  who  has  not 
learned  self-control  may  be  betrayed  by  her 
203 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

temper  and  her  voice  may  reveal  a  state  of 
things  that  those  who  love  her  must  deplore. 
Not  only  should  you  be  careful  about  your 
voice  in  private,  but  do  not  overlook  the 
fact  that  in  public  places  a  girl's  voice  should 
not  be  so  raised  as  to  make  her  conspicuous. 
For  instance,  if  you  go  to  a  matinee  or  a 
concert,  have  in  mind  the  people  about  you 
who  have  bought  tickets  and  wish  to  listen 
to  the  performers,  and  do  not  let  your  own 
conversation  go  on  at  a  time  when  attention 
should  be  focused  on  the  stage.  If  you  are 
in  a  car  make  it  a  rule  neither  to  discuss  your 
friends  nor  mention  absent  persons  by  name. 
This  is  a  little  world,  and  you  never  know 
but  somebody  may  be  near  you  who  knows 
all  about  yourself  and  the  persons  about 
whom  you  are  talking.  A  girl  may  live  in 
New  York,  Philadelphia,  or  Louisville,  and 
she  may  be  talking  in  San  Francisco  or  Cal- 
cutta or  Bombay  with  a  friend  about  another 
friend  whose  home  is  in  Columbus  or  Talla- 
hassee, and  some  unknown  passer  or  person 
standing  or  sitting  near,  may  hear  secrets  not 
meant  for  outsiders  and  may  know  perfectly 
204 


THE  SWEET-VOICED  GIRL 

well  the  people  who  are  mentioned.  As  you 
grow  older  you  will  more  and  more  be 
amazed  to  discover  what  a  little  world  this 
is,  and  how  likely  people  are  to  have  met 
other  people  all  around  the  globe. 

Refinement  and  intelligence  are  shown  by 
the  voice  as  quickly  as  by  the  face.  Illiterate 
people  sometimes  have  sweet  voices,  espe- 
cially in  some  countries,  but  in  ours  with  our 
harsh  climate,  keen  winds  and  frequent 
changes  of  weather,  we  shall  not  have  the 
velvet  voices  of  our  English  cousins  unless 
we  make  it  our  ambition  to  obtain  them. 
Climate,  of  course,  has  a  marked  effect  upon 
the  voice.  The  dweller  in  the  mountain  and 
the  dweller  by  the  sea  speak  in  different 
cadences,  but  you  girls,  wherever  you  are, 
may  have  sweet  voices  if  you  want  them. 
You  will  not  have  them,  it  may  be,  without 
an  effort  and  without  taking  pains,  but  the 
effort  is  worth  making.  Don't  be  affected. 
If  you  are  taught  to  use  the  broad  a  in  school 
and  if  you  have  been  accustomed  to  it  at 
home,  you  are  fortunate,  for  it  is  correct  and 
pleasing,  but  it  is  rather  funny  to  hear  a  girl 
205 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

attempt  the  broad  a  if  she  merely  pins  it  on 
her  speech  like  a  bow  on  a  dress,  uses  it  some- 
times and  sometimes  forgets  it.  Above  all 
things  be  natural.  Affectation  is  a  badge  of 
insincerity  and  shows  a  shallow  character. 
Be  yourself,  but  make  yourself  in  everything 
as  delightful  as  you  can. 


206 


CHAPTER  XXIX 

A   GOOD    MEMORY 

T^\OROTHY  tells  me  that  she  has  a  very 
^~^  poor  memory.  Shaking  her  head  as  if 
the  calamity  were  something  never  to  be 
remedied,  she  insists  that  she  cannot  get  her 
lessons  or  fix  anything  useful  in  her  mind  be- 
cause things  roll  off  it  as  water  runs  down- 
hill. 

I  must  admit  that  I  have  met  people  whose 
minds  were  like  sieves,  and  whose  memories 
were  pockets  with  holes,  and  other  people 
there  are  whose  power  of  remembering  seems 
limited  to  whatever  is  not  worth  while.  But 
I  have  always  been  quite  sure  that  we  may 
have  good  memories  if  we  choose  to  take 
the  trouble  to  cultivate  them.  Memory  is 
a  useful  servant  and  if  treated  like  a  servant 
and  held  responsible,  it  will  not  disappoint 
its  employer. 

207 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

There  are  exceptional  cases  where  an  ill- 
ness or  a  blow  on  the  head  destroy  memory 
for  a  time.  If  you  have  concussion  of  the 
brain  you  will  very  likely  have  to  pick  up 
your  memory  of  the  past  little  by  little  till 
the  fragments  are  pieced  into  a  whole. 
Fortunately,  few  school  girls  have  concus- 
sion of  the  brain.  Most  of  you  may  remem- 
ber whatever  you  choose,  if  you  have  two  ex- 
cellent qualities,  concentration  and  attention. 

A  good  rule  is  to  think  only  of  one  thing 
at  a  time  and  think  of  that  with  all  your 
might.  If  the  object  of  the  moment  is  a 
lesson  in  geography  or  a  date  in  history  or 
a  proposition  in  geometry,  think  of  that  and 
think  of  nothing  else  till  you  have  mastered 
it.  Never  mind  about  Virginia's  hat  or 
Blanche's  new  dress  or  the  fetching  way  in 
which  Evangeline  is  doing  up  her  hair. 
The  thing  you  have  to  do  is  to  get  hold  of 
that  date,  that  boundary  or  that  proposition. 

If  you  are  taking  music  lessons,  cultivate 
a  musical  memory.  This,  too,  depends  al- 
most entirely  on  concentration  and  attention. 
It  depends  somewhat,  but  not  wholly,  upon 
208 


A  GOOD  MEMORY 


the  ear,  but  if  a  girl  chooses  she  may  learn 
by  heart  some  of  the  pieces  she  can  play  and 
then  when  a  tired  father  asks  to  be  enter- 
tained in  the  evening,  or  she  goes  to  visit 
her  Aunt  Fanny,  she  is  not  obliged  to  carry 
her  music  with  her;  it  should  be  in  her  brain 
and  at  her  finger  tips. 

A  good  memory  for  faces  and  names  will 
make  you  very  popular  in  society  when  you 
are  older.  Memory  of  this  kind  is  cultivated 
by  princes  and  royal  folk  in  general.  It  is 
always  a  compliment  to  be  remembered,  and 
there  is  something  very  like  a  dash  of  cold 
water  in  the  face  when  one  expects  to  be  re- 
membered and  finds  herself  forgotten. 

Now  that  I  have  said  this,  let  me  advise 
girls  to  discriminate  between  what  their  mem- 
ories should  carry  by  sheer  force  of  deter- 
mination and  what  they  may  safely  trust  to 
a  memorandum.  It  is  not  at  all  needful  that 
you  bear  in  your  memory  the  streets  and  num- 
bers, the  townships  and  counties  of  all  your 
acquaintances.  Commit  these  particulars  to 
an  address  book.  A  pad  and  pencil  may  very 
properly  assist  you  in  keeping  the  record  of 
209 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

the  day's  or  the  week's  engagements.  When 
once  you  have  written  a  thing  down  and 
know  that  you  can  put  your  hand  on  it  at  a 
moment's  notice,  you  need  not  try  to  remem- 
ber it  as  well.  The  memorandum  is  suffi- 
cient. 

There  are  girls  who  never  seem  able  to 
remember  their  lessons,  or  to  remember  ap- 
pointments they  ought  to  keep,  who  still  have 
what  I  call  the  wrong  kind  of  memory.  If 
anybody  has  ever  treated  them  meanly  or 
done  something  unkind  or  said  something 
they  did  not  like,  they  are  sure  to  remember 
that.  I  have  heard  people  boast  that  they 
never  forgot  an  injury.  Let  me  remind  you, 
girls,  that  there  is  nothing  noble  in  cherish- 
ing a  grudge.  The  thing  to  do  when  any- 
one has  wronged  us  is,  as  soon  as  we  can,  to 
forgive  and  forget.  We  do  not  forgive  un- 
less we  forget,  and  the  more  complete  is  our 
forgiveness  the  better  we  are  and  the  more 
allied  to  the  Divine. 

If  Dorothy,  conscious  of  a  treacherous 
memory,  is  in  downright  earnest,  she  may 
without  much  difficulty  change  it  for  a  good 
210 


A  GOOD  MEMORY 


one.  The  way  to  do  is  to  be  very  firm  and 
stern  with  your  memory,  compelling  it  to 
obey  you.  I  do  not  believe  very  much  in 
tricks  and  rhymes  and  systems  for  strength- 
ening memory.  You  may,  if  you  choose,  try 
what  you  can  do  by  association.  For  in- 
stance, fix  a  date  in  your  mind  by  remember- 
ing something  about  the  room  in  which  you 
were  studying,  or  the  teacher  to  whom  you 
recited,  or  the  color  of  a  flower  upon  your 
desk.  Certain  dates  in  my  mind  are  asso- 
ciated with  red  and  others  with  yellow. 

You  may  connect  an  occurrence  and  a  place 
in  the  same  way.  If  your  memory  is  not 
retentive  as  to  rules  and  phrases,  learn  a  cer- 
tain number  of  them  by  heart  every  day.  If 
you  had  been  a  girl  when  I  was,  you  would 
have  fastened  in  your  memory  as  nails  are 
fastened  in  a  sure  place,  all  the  rules  and 
notes  and  exceptions  in  the  grammar  of  one 
learned  Goold  Brown,  whose  very  name  is 
dear  to  me  to  this  day.  How  many  sum- 
mer hours,  and  winter  ones,  too,  I  spent  over 
Mr.  Brown's  leather-covered  volume.  We 
girls  were  obliged  to  repeat  all  the  rules  in 
211 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

grammar  and  arithmetic  precisely  as  they 
were  put  down  in  the  book,  and  we  did  it. 
The  dullest  girl  did  it  and  so  did  the  bright- 
est. Absolute  accuracy  in  repeating  the  text 
was  required  of  everyone. 

Then  we  recited  long  passages  from  Cow- 
per's  "Task,"  Pope's  "Essay  on  Man," 
and  Milton's  "  Paradise  Lost."  We  learned 
pages  and  pages  of  history,  reciting  exactly  the 
words  of  the  book.  Very  few  of  us  had  oc- 
casion to  complain  of  poor  memories,  because 
our  memories  were  very  much  like  soldiers 
on  drill  or  day  laborers  digging  ditches. 
We  had  a  certain  amount  to  do,  and  our 
memories  were  there  to  help  us. 

I  recommend  as  a  good  exercise  for  you 
some  study  of  current  events.  Each  morn- 
ing read  the  daily  paper.  See  what  is  hap- 
pening in  Europe,  in  Asia  and  in  America. 
After  you  have  finished  reading  the  paper, 
take  a  blank  book  and  write  down  in  order 
and  in  your  own  words  the  gist  of  what  you 
have  read.  This  will  aid  not  your  verbal 
memory,  but  what  I  may  call  your  picture 
memory.  Do  this  every  day  for  three  hun- 
212 


A  GOOD  MEMORY 


dred  and  sixty-five  days,  and  you  will  dis- 
cover that  your  memory  is  quite  as  trust- 
worthy as  that  of  anybody  else  in  the  circle 
of  your  friends. 

Another  thing  that  you  may  do  is  in  an- 
other line.  Memorize  poetry.  For  Cowper 
substitute  Longfellow,  and  for  Pope  take 
Kipling.  Choose  anything  that  you  like,  but 
get  by  heart  each  day  from  four  to  eight 
lines  of  verse.  Gradually  you  will  find  your 
memory  a  storehouse  of  treasures  from  which 
you  may  draw  whenever  you  please. 


213 


CHAPTER  XXX 

HEALTH 

TF  you  ever,  in  the  house  of  some  old- 
A  fashioned  friend,  pick  up  one  of  those 
elegant  gift  books  which  were  in  vogue  in  the 
'50*8,  you  will  remember  the  steel  engrav- 
ing that  showed  the  ideal  girl  of  yesterday. 

She  was  a  willowy  creature,  with  a  delicate 
face,  long  silken  ringlets  shading  her  cheek, 
a  very  small  waist,  and  long  graceful  hands. 
She  had  been  taught  to  do  embroidery  and 
other  fine  needle  work.  She  excelled  in  the 
piano  playing  of  her  day,  and  she  was  refined 
and  reposeful.  But  there  was  something  a 
little  depressing  in  her  charm.  A  dirgelike 
hymn,  familiar  to  your  mothers,  epitomizes 
that  girl  as  she  used  to  be. 

"  Sister,  thou  wast  mild  and  lovely, 

Gentle  as  a  summer  breeze, 
Pleasant  as  the  air  of  evening, 

When  it  stirred  among  the  trees." 
2I4 


HEALTH 

I  have  attended  the  funeral  of  more  than 
one  such  exquisite  girl,  and  have  helped 
to  sing  that  very  hymn  beside  the  silent 
sleeper.  With  the  knowledge  of  hygiene, 
which  is  universal  in  the  twentieth  century, 
we  are  learning  that  the  girls  who  used  to  be 
sacrificed  on  the  altar  of  a  mistaken  ideal 
need  not  have  died  so  soon.  Very  early  in 
life  they  were  taught  not  to  run  or  jump,  or 
do  anything  unfit  for  a  little  lady,  and  as  they 
grew  older  they  wore  tight  stays,  abridging 
their  breathing  power;  they  slept  in  unven- 
tilated  rooms,  being  afraid  of  the  night  air, 
and  if  by  any  fatal  chance  they  came  near  a 
case  of  tuberculosis,  they  fell  victims  to  it 
along  the  line  of  least  resistance. 

It  may  have  been  twenty  years  ago  or 
more  that  the  reaction  against  this  style  of 
feminine  languor  reached  its  height.  Then, 
the  athletic  girl  was  greatly  in  evidence.  So 
far  from  caring  at  all  about  her  looks,  she 
was  intensely  proud  of  a  sun-bronzed  and 
wind-tanned  complexion,  of  red  hands  and 
arms,  and  of  a  sort  of  rude  robustness  that 
eliminated  the  touch  of  daintiness  to  which 
215 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

every  girl  should  aspire.  We  have  reached 
a  saner  day,  and  our  girls  have  learned  that 
they  may  live  an  outdoor  life,  have  perfect 
health  and  lose  no  jot  of  attractiveness. 

I  well  remember  in  my  girlhood  hearing  a 
young  man  comment  unfavorably  on  the  thick- 
ness of  my  walking  shoes.  He  said,  sotto 
voce:  "  How  can  that  girl's  mother  let  her 
wear  those  clumsy,  thick-soled  shoes  ?  "  Be- 
ing well  acquainted  with  the  youth,  I  ventured 
to  tell  him  that  the  shoes  were  adapted  to  the 
climate  and  the  weather  and  enabled  me  to 
take  long  walks  without  discomfort.  He  re- 
plied :  "  No  elegant  young  woman  ever  takes 
long  walks,  or  wears  anything  except  thin- 
soled  shoes."  I  suppose  few  girls  who  have 
grown  up  under  the  excellent  regime  which 
teaches  us  to  dress  properly  for  the  weather, 
can  believe  that  this  critic  voiced  a  general 
opinion.  I  have  had  reason  all  my  life  to  be 
grateful  for  the  independence  and  wisdom  of 
a  very  sensible  mother,  who  thought  it  a  duty 
of  her  daughters  to  be  well.  Not  merely  a 
privilege  —  a  positive,  religious  duty. 

Without  health,  one's  pleasure  is  inter- 
216 


HEALTH 

fered  with  on  every  turn.  This  would  be  a 
small  matter  if  one's  chances  to  be  useful 
were  not  also  greatly  diminished  by  fragile 
and  uncertain  health.  People  who  are  mor- 
bid and  blue,  and  easily  discouraged,  who 
make  mountains  out  of  molehills  and  see  lions 
in  the  way  where  others  walk  safely,  are 
usually  the  prey  of  their  nerves  and  have  not 
reserve  force  enough  to  carry  them  through 
what  they  undertake.  Schoolgirls,  and  those 
at  college,  too,  sometimes  break  down  through 
overwork,  although  I  am  inclined  to  think 
that  this  is  seldom  the  case  unless  in  addition 
to  their  legitimate  work  they  attempt  some- 
thing else. 

Unless  a  girl  is  very  strong,  she  should  not 
try  to  pay  her  way  through  school  or  college 
by  her  own  work.  Some  girls  do  this  suc- 
cessfully, but  they  are  exceptional.  Still 
more  dangerous  is  the  effort  to  combine  study 
and  society.  The  girl  at  high  school,  liv- 
ing at  home  and  trying  to  go  to  parties  and 
concerts  and  other  evening  amusements,  can- 
not maintain  her  proper  rank  in  the  class 
room. 

217 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

Briefly  stated,  unbroken  health  is  within  the 
reach  of  most  of  us.  We  are  fortunate  if 
we  have  inherited  vigorous  bodies  from  pa- 
rents and  grandparents.  Yet  if  we  have  be- 
gun life  with  tendencies  to  delicate  health, 
we  may  overcome  them  by  resolute  will,  care- 
ful dieting  and  generally  hygienic  living.  An 
abundance  of  good,  plain,  nutritious  food  is 
essential  to  health. 

Thousands  of  schoolgirls  owe  their  dull 
eyes,  sallow  complexions,  pimples  and  fre- 
quent headaches  to  constant  surfeiting  on  rich 
food  and  to  eating  too  many  sweets.  A  habit 
of  eating  between  meals,  nibbling  chocolates 
and  bonbons  is  fatal  to  digestion  and  good 
looks.  x  A  girl  who  is  half  sick  most  of  her 
time  will  lose  her  comeliness,  and  as  beauty 
is  the  birthright  of  schoolgirls,  which  they 
should  not  sell  for  the  modern  mess  of  pot- 
tage in  the  confectioner's  window,  one  cannot 
but  regret  the  spendthrift  folly. 

Equally  fatal  to  health  is  the  habit  of  tak- 
ing drugs.  The  girl  who  never  gets  far 
from  the  pill  box  will  not  have  the  high  spir- 
its and  gay  good  humor  which  should  be  her 
218 


HEALTH 

portion.  I  seldom  see  a  group  of  girls  stand- 
ing around  a  soda  fountain  without  wishing 
that  they  knew  the  advantages  of  drinking 
plain  cold  water,  only  that  and  plenty  of  it, 
and  letting  sweetened  syrups  alone.  Fruit 
should  take  the  place  of  pastry,  and  it  is  bet- 
ter for  growing  girls  wholly  to  omit  coffee 
and  tea  from  their  bill  of  fare.  Bread  at 
least  a  day  old  is  a  better  choice  for  a  beauti- 
ful girl  than  hot  biscuits,  and  fried  food 
should  not  be  chosen  if  anything  else  can  be 
had. 

Another  secret  of  health  for  the  schoolgirl 
is  plenty  of  sleep.  The  beauty  sleep  must  be 
taken  before  midnight.  Go  early  to  bed  if 
you  would  be  strong  and  equal  to  whatever 
you  have  to  do.  The  temptation  to  sit  up 
late  because  others  do  so  is  always  great,  but 
it  should  be  resisted. 

The  schoolgirls  who  read  this  talk  may  be 
thankful  they  are  not  situated  as  one  girl  was 
to  whom  a  settlement  worker  in  New  York 
said  one  evening:  "  Mabel,  you  are  looking 
ill  and  fagged.  You  sit  up  too  late  at  night 
after  your  long  hours  in  the  factory." 
219 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

"  Yes,"  said  Mabel,  "  I  know  it,  but  there 
are  eleven  of  us  to  sleep  in  two  rooms,  and 
my  bed  is  not  pulled  down  from  the  pile  of 
mattresses  until  nearly  midnight.  I  have  to 
sit  up.  I  have  no  room  of  my  own." 

The  poor  girl  was  not  responsible  for  her 
short  nights  of  rest.  To  sleep  long  hours  in 
a  vitiated  atmosphere  is  to  breathe  poison,  so 
a  girl  who  does  not  want  to  be  tired  and 
languid  must  have  fresh  air  in  her  room  all 
night. 

Nor  must  she  neglect  the  daily  bath.  The 
best  complexion  cosmetic  that  anyone  can  use 
is  water,  cold  or  tepid,  as  preferred.  Every 
day  of  one's  life,  preferably  in  the  morning, 
one  should  bathe  from  head  to  foot,  after- 
ward rubbing  hard  with  a  coarse  towel,  so 
that  the  skin  may  be  in  a  healthful  glow. 

These  directions  may  seem  very  primitive, 
but  there  are  always  those  who  need  them. 
Health  is  largely  a  matter  of  the  will  and  of 
minding  simple  rules  every  day.  We  may 
be  well  if  we  will  but  take  the  trouble. 

I  wish  I  could  persuade  every  girl  in  the 
land  to  revere  the  house  in  which  she  lives. 
220 


HEALTH 

The  body  is  the  soul's  house.  Body  and  soul 
are  strangely  united.  If  we  abuse  the  body 
we  suffer  pain,  if  we  treat  it  with  fairness  and 
give  it  freedom,  if  we  feel  for  it  the  rever- 
ence we  should,  we  go  through  life  cheerfully 
equal  to  the  day's  work.  The  foundation 
for  a  heathful,  happy  life  is  laid  in  youth. 
You  are  building  for  to-morrow.  In  many 
cases  a  headache  is  more  than  a  blunder;  it  is 
a  sin.  There  are  no  doubt  times  when  this 
language  is  too  strong  to  fit  the  occasion,  but 
taking  the  great  host  of  schoolgirls  as  they 
are,  they  have  no  need  to  be  nervous,  irritable 
or  in  any  way  depressed  by  any  physical  dis- 
tress whatever.  If  they  will  obey  the  laws 
of  health  they  will  be  well. 


221 


CHAPTER  XXXI 

THE    CARE    OF   THE    EYES 

/CONSIDERING  that  your  eyes  are  not 
^^^  only  given  you  for  ornament,  but  for 
use,  and  that  as  they  have  to  last  you  during 
your  whole  life,  you  ought  to  take  great  care 
of  them.  What  color  are  they  —  hazel, 
gray,  blue,  brown  or  black?  Whatever  their 
color  may  be  it  is  the  one  that  best  suits  your 
face,  and  whether  you  know  it  or  not,  your 
friends  are  of  the  opinion  that  you  have  the 
prettiest  eyes  in  the  world. 

A  great  deal  of  expression  is  in  the  eye. 
Eyes  that  are  wide-open  and  straightforward, 
that  look  others  fully  in  the  face,  that  have 
nothing  to  hide,  are  very  beautiful  eyes,  who- 
ever has  them.  Of  course  they  are  set  off 
by  the  long  fringing  lashes  and  the  well- 
defined  eyebrows  that,  so  to  speak,  constitute 
their  frame.  No  girl  can  be  regarded  as 

222 


THE  CARE  OF  THE  EYES 

plain  or  unattractive  who  has  good,  clear 
eyes,  with  the  silken  lashes  and  delicately  pen- 
ciled brows  that  artists  and  poets  rave  about. 

What  troubles  me  is  to  notice  the  liberties 
many  young  girls  take  with  their  eyes.  They 
sit  reading  at  that  hour  of  the  day  when  the 
light  is  waning,  and  the  effort  to  discern 
what  is  on  the  page  is  continuous.  If  it  is 
hard  for  you  to  see,  your  eyes  are  being  un- 
duly taxed.  There  is  a  popular  impression 
that  young  people  strain  their  eyes  by  gazing 
at  distant  objects.  They  much  oftener  strain 
them  badly  by  fixing  them  too  closely  on  ob- 
jects near  at  hand.  Thus,  the  near-sighted 
person  or  the  person  whose  eyes  do  not  see 
equally,  is  always  subject  to  a  strain  which  is 
wearing  on  the  eyes  and  is  the  obscure  cause 
of  many  headaches. 

If  you  find  in  the  schoolroom  that  you  do 
not  easily  read  lines  or  figures  on  the  black- 
board, or  if  you  have  trouble  in  looking  out 
places  on  the  map,  or  hunting  up  words  and 
definitions  in  the  dictionary,  you  may  be  very 
sure  that  your  eyes  need  attention.  Very  likely 
an  oculist  would  help  you  at  once  by  fitting 
223 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

you  with  the  right  lens,  and  you  would  real- 
ize what  you  had  not  known  before,  that  you 
had  been  doing  your  work  with  a  handicap 
that  put  you  at  a  disadvantage.  No  one  can 
do  her  best  if  she  feels  fretted,  irritated  and 
harassed.  A  girl  who  is  nervous  cannot 
stand  well  in  her  classes. 

Not  long  ago,  a  girl  friend  of  mine  who 
had  devoted  many  hours  of  every  week  to 
music  for  some  years,  found  the  notes  blur- 
ring before  her,  and  suffered  a  good  deal  of 
torture  and  pain  when  she  attempted  to  read 
the  pages  that  had  been  hitherto  as  plain  as 
print.  The  specialist  whom  she  consulted 
told  her  that  she  had  so  recklessly  used  her 
eyesight  that  although  a  mere  girl,  she  had 
the  eyes  of  an  old  woman.  I  should  be  very 
sorry  to  think  that  any  girl  who  reads  this 
would  make  such  a  mistake  as  this,  for  it  liter- 
ally would  shadow  the  rest  of  her  life. 

In  reading,  let  the  light  fall  over  the  left 

shoulder,  and  sit  so  that  it  will  do  so  rather 

than  facing  it  if  you  can.     Do  not  attempt 

to  study  with  an  insufficient  light.     A  stu- 

224 


THE  CARE  OF  THE  EYES 

dent's  lamp  that  burns  steadily  is  a  good  in- 
vestment. 

Frequent  bathing  with  cold  water  strength- 
ens the  eyes.  It  is  a  good  plan  to  fill  a  tum- 
bler to  the  brim  with  pure  water  and  then 
wink  the  eyes  in  it  so  that  a  drop  or  two  will 
sift  under  the  lids. 

A  physician  has  said  "  when  you  get  any- 
thing in  the  eye  in  order  to  get  it  out  the 
lower  lid  should  be  pulled  down,  the  eye 
should  look  down  toward  the  floor  and 
slightly  toward  the  nose.  If  nothing  is 
found  in  this  part  then  the  upper  lid  can  be 
turned  back  and  search  made  there."  One 
cannot  very  well  do  this  for  herself,  and  the 
friend  who  does  it  must  have  a  steady  hand 
and  a  very  deft  touch. 

Remember  while  working,  to  sit  as  erect 
as  you  can.  Do  not  stoop.  Do  not  read  in 
a  train  or  carriage,  where  the  constant  move- 
ment of  the  book  obliges  a  continual  change 
of  focus.  Very  fine  needlework  is  trying  to 
the  eyes. 

A  well-known  oculist  has  said  that  the  ideal 
book  has  good  type,  well  spaced,  on  unglazed 
225 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

paper.  A  book  should  be  held  nearly  on  a 
level  with  the  eyes  and  if  very  heavy,  should 
be  supported  by  a  rest.  Do  not  read  or  study 
when  lying  down. 

I  wonder  if  I  may  say  something  here  that 
has  not  so  much  to  do  with  the  eye  itself  as 
with  the  brain  behind  it.  There  are  people 
who  are  much  too  quick  to  see  faults  and 
defects  in  others.  They  are  critical  and  cen- 
sorious, and  you  may  be  sure  if  there  is  a  flaw 
anywhere  they  will  pounce  upon  it  without 
mercy.  Look  for  the  blemishes  in  your  own 
conduct  and  character,  if  you  choose.  But 
take  good  care  not  to  search  for  them  in  the 
behavior  of  your  neighbors. 

The  eyes  that  are  quick  to  discover  when 
somebody  needs  help,  that  are  ready  to 
thread  a  needle  for  somebody  who  no  longer 
does  it  easily  for  herself,  that  are  willing  to 
help  the  blind  or  to  amuse  children  are  the 
eyes  one  loves  best. 

More  than  any  other  feature,  the  eyes  re- 
veal the  soul.  A  furtive,  downcast,  shifty 
eye  is  the  sign  of  deceit  and  hypocrisy.  I  do 
not  think  I  have  ever  seen  a  sweet  young  girl 
226 


THE  CARE  OF  THE  EYES 

with  such  an  eye  or  with  the  expression  that 
comes  from  conscious  wrongdoing.  Eyes 
that  have  nothing  to  fear,  that  are  brave  and 
true,  and  that  have  never  had  behind  them 
a  cowardly  or  impure  thought,  are  the  eyes 
we  love  in  our  daughters. 


227 


CHAPTER  XXXII 

DRESS 

4t  T  ESSIE  has  reached  the  age  when  she 
^  fusses  and  fidgets  about  her  dress, 
looks  at  herself  in  the  glass,  worries  because 
her  cloak  or  her  hat  or  her  jacket  or  some- 
thing else  is  last  year's  style,  and  altogether 
behaves  like  a  vain  and  silly  girl,"  exclaimed 
Jessie's  aunt,  who  had  no  patience  with  such 
frivolous  conduct. 

"  If  Jessie  had  been  the  fourth  daughter 
in  a  large  family,"  said  Mary  Elizabeth, 
looking  up  with  a  smile,  "  she  would  have 
learned  to  be  thankful  for  small  favors. 
Until  I  had  passed  my  thirteenth  birthday  I 
never  once  went  out  of  the  house  with  a  cos- 
tume every  bit  of  which  had  been  made  for 
me.  I  usually  wore  Susan's  last  year's  frocks 
and  Mildred's  last  year's  hats,  retrimmed 
and  freshened  up,  and  when  I  had  a  jacket 
228 


DRESS 

it  had  been  worn  before  me  by  Ethel. 
Mother  always  bought  good  things  that 
would  last  and  they  lasted  until  several  chil- 
dren wore  them  out.  I  was  cured  of  fussi- 
ness  before  so  much  as  a  wee  leaf  of  it 
cropped  up  in  my  character.  Generally  speak- 
ing I  had  new  shoes  and  that  was  a  comfort." 

Jessie  had  listened  to  both  speakers  with 
an  air  of  serious  attention. 

"  I  love  pretty  things,"  said  she,  "  and  I 
hate  ugly  ones.  Why  shall  sister  Louise, 
who  is  a  young  lady,  wear  a  corset  that  gives 
her  a  good  figure  while  I  who  have  no  figure 
at  all  am  obliged  to  wear  a  corded  waist  and 
button  my  skirts  to  it?  " 

By  this  time  I  was  so  stirred  up  that  I  was 
compelled  to  intrude  my  views  on  the  girls. 

"  What  on  earth  can  you  be  thinking  of, 
Jessie?  A  schoolgirl's  first  duty  to  herself 
is  to  wear  healthful  dress  and  although  cor- 
sets are  excellent  and  suitable  in  their  place 
for  grown  up  young  women,  they  are  not 
parts  of  hygienic  dress  for  you.  I  hope  that 
you  spend  a  good  many  hours  every  day  out 
of  doors,  and  that  your  director  of  physical 
229 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

culture  superintends  your  calisthenics  and 
your  exercises  in  the  gymnasium.  The  gym 
is  as  much  an  educational  place  for  you  as 
the  Latin  class  or  the  recitation  room  where 
you  study  and  present  any  other  abstruse  sub- 
ject in  the  school.  For  daily  use  a  schoolgirl 
needs  well-made  loosely  fitting  blouses  and 
skirts,  and  the  weight  of  her  clothing  should 
hang  not  from  the  hips  but  from  the  shoulder. 

"  Deep  breathing  is  your  great  necessity; 
your  lungs  should  be  filled  daily  and  often 
with  the  purest  air  and  your  chest  have  abun- 
dant room  to  expand.  As  for  shoes,  you 
must  have  common-sense  lasts  broad  enough 
in  the  sole  and  low  enough  in  the  heel  to  en- 
able you  to  walk  with  ease  and  grace.  A 
schoolgirl  must  not  wear  a  tight  shoe  nor  a 
high  heel.  You  are  too  young  and  too 
pretty  to  require  much  ornament  in  your 
dress,  and  there  is  no  sense  in  your  fussing 
over  shirt  waists  and  simple  stocks,  hair  rib- 
bons and  belts. 

"  Once  your  wardrobe  is  supplied  with 
what  is  comfortable  and  you  have  equipped 
yourself  with  a  golf  cape,  a  rain  coat  and  a 


DRESS 

sailor  hat,  you  are  ready  for  every  occasion." 
"  For  receptions  and  commencements  and 
Sunday  evenings  at  home?"  queried  Jessie, 
her  dimples  playing  hide  and  seek  as  she 
archly  glanced  at  me. 

"  I  beg  your  pardon,"  I  answered.  "  A 
girl  does  need  one  or  two  dainty  frocks  for 
evening  wear  and  they  should  preferably  be 
white.  The  simpler  they  are  the  more  suit- 
able they  are  sure  to  be.  A  great  many 
tucks,  puffs,  ruffles  and  lace  insertions  are 
misplaced  in  a  girl's  dress  while  she  is  yet  in 
her  teens.  There  may  be,  of  course,  some 
unobtrusive  decorations,  but  not  very  much 
is  needed,  for  she  herself  sets  off  her  gown. 

"  I  like  to  think,  too,  that  a  girl  who  is 
growing  up  takes  a  little  time  now  and  then 
to  bestow  attention  on  the  laundress  who  has 
to  wash  and  iron  the  dainty  muslins  that 
are  so  elaborate  and  so  beautifully  finished 
with  lace  edges  and  delicate  embroideries. 
A  girl  who  has  once  or  twice  done  her 
own  laundry  work,  washed  and  ironed  a 
white  muslin  gown,  or  a  duck  skirt,  will  know 
by  experience  that  it  is  far  from  easy  work, 
231 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

and  she  will  be  somewhat  more  careful  about 
frequently  sending  it  to  the  tub,  than  her 
friend  who  has  had  no  such  personal  knowl- 
edge of  the  labor  involved." 

No  young  girl  has  the  slightest  occasion  to 
worry  about  her  figure  if  she  only  has  a  dress 
that  fits  her  comfortably,  if  she  stands  up 
straight,  throwing  back  her  shoulders  and 
holding  up  her  head.  The  figure  will  take 
care  of  itself.  Health  is  the  great  beautifier 
and  sensible  dress  is  for  young  people  its  best 
ally. 

Fortunately  for  young  girls,  there  is  no 
question  about  the  length  of  their  skirts. 
For  everyday  wear  frocks  that  reach  the 
ankle,  are  comfortable  and  insure  ease  in 
walking,  and  immunity  from  contact  with 
mud  and  dirt.  For  functions  such  as  Jessie 
referred  to  in  her  nai've  question  about  recep- 
tions and  Sunday  evenings,  a  girl's  best  gown 
while  she  is  in  her  teens  may  be  instep  length. 
Girls  never  wear  trailing  skirts  in  these  days. 
An  excellent  adjunct  to  cleanliness,  comfort 
and  health  is  a  whisk-broom  or  a  clothes- 
brush  scrupulously  used  every  time  a  dress  is 
232 


DRESS 

taken  off.  If  we  would  carefully  brush  our 
clothes  and  shake  them  out  of  an  open  win- 
dow before  hanging  them  in  closets  or  ward- 
robes, we  should  rid  ourselves  of  the  danger 
of  germs  that  may  have  lurked  in  outside 
dust. 

Girls  should  be  grateful  that  their  lot  is 
cast  in  the  twentieth  century.  An  eighteenth 
century  girl,  or  one  born  in  the  early  nine- 
teenth, wore  a  short-waisted  frock  with  the 
skirt  beginning  under  the  arm-pits.  It  was 
of  clinging  stuff  and  swept  the  floor  as  she 
walked.  Her  shoes  were  thin  slippers  with- 
out heels  held  on  by  strings  crossed  over  the 
instep  and  around  the  ankles.  On  her  head 
she  often  wore  a  construction  of  muslin  and 
wire  that  was  half  turban  and  half  cap. 
Her  sleeves  were  short  and  her  dresses  half 
low  at  the  neck,  as  a  rule.  Do  you  not  think 
that  you  are  much  better  dressed  than  she 
was,  both  for  health  and  beauty? 


233 


CHAPTER  XXXIII 

MAGNIFYING   TROUBLES 

in  a  while  we  fail,  do  we  not, 
girls?  There  is  something  on  which 
we  have  set  our  hearts,  some  perfectly  right 
and  desirable  thing,  but  we  cannot  get  it. 
We  have  tried  faithfully  to  the  best  of  our 
ability.  But  we  are  disappointed.  We  feel 
very  much  as  we  would  if  we  saw  somebody 
else  climbing,  without  the  least  trouble,  to 
the  top  of  a  mountain,  while  we  kept  sliding 
back  to  the  bottom. 

Everybody  cannot  be  equally  successful, 
and  a  friend  of  a  classmate  often  seems  to 
gain  without  much  effort  whatever  she  wants, 
while  we  lose.  It  is  so  in  many  departments 
of  life  outside  of  the  schoolroom.  It  is  not 
only  that  another  girl  wins  the  gold  medal 
for  proficiency,  while  we  have  not  even  a 
mention  on  the  honor  list;  that  another  al- 
234 


MAGNIFYING  TROUBLES 

ways  has  reports  enriched  with  a  double  A, 
while  we  have  only  a  B  or  C,  but  there  are 
other  failures  that  try  our  hearts  quite  as 
much. 

Another  girl  makes  a  friendship  where 
we  have  only  a  slight  acquaintance,  or  goes 
off  on  a  splendid  trip  to  Europe,  while  we 
stay  at  home  without  change  of  scene.  The 
fact  is,  if  we  choose  to  disturb  ourselves 
about  them,  the  small  disappointments  of  life 
are  endless.  The  great  ones,  too,  occur  now 
and  then.  It  is  a  test  of  character  to  meet 
discouragements  bravely,  and  to  refuse  to 
be  downcast  and  blue,  when  we  fail  in  an 
attempt  through  no  fault  of  our  own. 

As  I  write  I  am  thinking  of  a  girl  friend 
who  has  had  an  experience  which  will  show 
her  mettle  and  disclose  in  its  later  effect  the 
sort  of  girl  she  is.  Elizabeth  is  a  quick  and 
clever  girl,  who  learns  without  taking  much 
trouble,  and  who  has  a  reputation  in  her 
family  circle  for  extraordinary  genius.  She 
has  always  been  expected  to  carry  off  all  the 
prizes  in  sight.  Her  father  amuses  his 
friends  by  the  unconscious  vanity  which 

235 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

prompts  him  to  boast  of  Elizabeth's  spright- 
liness,  and  he  is  continually  repeating  her 
witty  speeches  and  telling  any  listener  whom 
he  can  buttonhole  the  story  of  her  latest  tri- 
umphs. Her  mother  has  less  to  say,  and  is 
more  tactful,  but  in  her  quiet,  unobtrusive 
fashion,  she  is  just  as  proud  of  her  daughter 
and  just  as  convinced  of  her  superior  talents 
as  her  good  husband  is.  Both  these  people, 
without  meaning  it,  have  puffed  up  Eliza- 
beth from  her  cradle,  with  the  result  that  she 
has  come  to  depend  entirely  too  much  on  her 
quickness  and  has  omitted  the  hard  study 
which  at  certain  points  is  indispensable.  You 
may  imagine  the  family  consternation  and 
chagrin  when  Elizabeth  failed  to  pass  her 
senior  examinations,  and  was  told  that  she 
would  have  to  take  her  last  year  over  if  she 
is  finally  to  be  graduated. 

A  year  does  not  look  very  long  to  your 
father  and  mother,  because  as  people  grow 
older  the  years  seem  fairly  to  rush  along  like 
waves  in  a  mill-race,  but  it  seems  a  tremen- 
dous thing  to  a  girl  of  seventeen.  It  looks  to 
her  like  a  long,  level  stretch  of  eternity.  If 
236 


MAGNIFYING  TROUBLES 

we  fail  in  anything  when  we  are  young  we 
are  tempted  to  fancy  that  we  never  can  make 
up  our  loss.  That  is  one  reason  why  young 
people  are  blue  when  they  ought  to  see 
everything  in  rose-color.  Once  we  allow 
ourselves  to  be  discouraged,  we  are  handi- 
capped. We  are  very  apt  in  such  moods  to 
discourage  others.  If  a  girl  in  Elizabeth's 
position  happens  to  be  preparing  to  teach, 
or  has  in  mind  a  determination  to  be  an  artist, 
or  a  journalist,  she  says  to  herself,  "  I  may 
as  well  give  it  up.  There  is  no  use  in  keep- 
ing on.  I  shall  never  attain  what  I  wish." 

"  Never  "  is  a  word  one  hears  on  the  lips 
of  schoolgirls  much  oftener  than  one  ought. 

Looking  over  a  closet  one  day  in  which  a 
middle-aged  woman  had  packed  away  many 
treasures  of  her  girlhood,  I  came  upon  a  lot 
of  old  schoolbooks.  In  one  of  them  I  found 
written  in  very  black  letters,  underscored, 
too,  on  the  margin  of  several  pages  the  word 
"  Despair."  "  Have  you  any  idea,"  I  said 
to  the  owner  of  the  books,  "  why  or  when 
you  wrote  this  word  on  these  pages?  " 

"  Oh,"  she  said,  with  a  laugh,  "  When  I 

237 


TAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 


was  fou^een  I  had  moods.  I  often  used  to 
think  that  I  had  almost  reached  the  jumping- 
off  place  of  the  world,  and  if  I  failed  in  a  les- 
son I  felt  as  if  the  disgrace  were  inscribed 
upon  me  in  letters  so  large  that  everybody 
could  see  them.  I  suppose  I  scribbled  that 
one  day  when  I  was  blue." 

A  woman  who  has  been  widely  known  as  a 
successful  writer  told  me  that  her  first  work 
during  the  first  year  of  her  struggle  to  enter 
the  profession  was  invariably  returned. 
"  Stories,  poems,  essays,"  she  said,  "  all  came 
hurrying  back,  declined  with  thanks,  and  I 
used  literally  many  a  time  to  wet  my  pillow 
with  tears.  Yet  the  oftener  I  failed  the  more 
determined  I  became  not  to  fail.  I  would 
just  pull  myself  together  and  work  harder  the 
next  time." 

In  the  case  of  a  student  who,  either 
through  illness  or  lack  of  painstaking  or  in- 
ability to  do  her  work,  misses  a  year,  the 
delay  may  be  a  blessing  in  disguise.  It  need 
not  be  an  irretrievable  loss.  One  thing  you 
and  I  should  guard  against  is  caring  too  much 
238 


MAGNIFYING  TROUBLES 

about  what  people  say.  A  hurt  to  vanity 
wounds  like  the  thrust  of  a  knife.  We  are 
often  so  mortified  because  our  friends  think 
us  slow  and  compare  us  as  we  imagine  with 
others  who  have  done  better  than  we,  that 
we  cease  our  endeavors  or  let  ourselves  be 
sidetracked  entirely  too  long. 

Occasionally  it  becomes  necessary  wholly 
to  change  the  plans  for  one's  life.  A  girl 
may  be  compelled  by  loss  of  health  or  finan- 
cial trouble  in  the  family  to  do  something 
quite  different  from  that  which  she  had  an- 
ticipated. If  this  is  duty,  be  brave  and  ac- 
cept it  without  making  a  fuss  and  com- 
plaining. 

This  is  such  a  bright  and  cheery  world  in 
which  we  live,  and  there  are  so  many  reasons 
for  being  happy,  that  it  is  a  positive  sin  for 
anybody  ever  to  be  blue.  When  a  girl  lets 
herself  drift  into  a  habit  of  self-pity  she  be- 
comes morbid  and  miserable,  makes  herself 
wretched  and  perhaps  loses  the  power  of 
controlling  her  nerves.  She  wants  to  scream. 
I  wish  you  and  I  could  understand  as  we 
239 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

ought  that,  however  we  may  feel  inside,  we 
never  have  a  right  to  show  our  friends  any- 
thing except  brightness  and  sympathy. 

To  let  ourselves  huddle  up  in  tearful  heaps, 
to  be  damp,  moist  and  unpleasant,  and  have 
hysterics  over  anything  whatever,  is  absurd 
and  shameful.  The  worst  failure  anyone 
can  have  is  a  failure  to  rule  one's  own  spirit 
and  behavior. 

In  the  "  Life  of  Burne-Jones,"  a  book  that 
is  full  of  glorious  courage,  there  are  con- 
tinual proofs  of  the  great  artist's  heroism. 
When  you  see  his  lovely  pictures  I  want  you 
to  remember  that  the  loveliest  thing  about 
him  was  his  refusal  ever  to  be  discouraged. 
He  made  his  friends  stronger  by  his  habit  of 
constant  cheerfulness.  We  ought  to  make 
stepping-stones  of  our  failures.  If  we  hap- 
pen not  to  succeed  to-day,  let  us  start  right 
over  and  succeed  to-morrow.  One  learns 
more  by  failing  than  by  gaining  easy  honors 
in  the  early  struggles  of  this  strenuous  time. 
The  one  who  fails  and  .tries  again  will  win 
at  last. 

240 


CHAPTER  XXXIV 

MINOR   MORALS 

TV/TINOR  morals?  What  on  earth  do  you 
mean  by  that  phrase?  I  seem  to  hear 
the  query  from  a  dozen  girls,  who  look  at 
me  with  reproachful  eyes.  Have  we  not 
been  taught,  they  say,  that  right  is  right,  and 
wrong  is  wrong,  and  there  is  no  middle  path? 
What  are  the  minor  morals?  The  girls  wish 
to  know.  Let  me  explain. 

Let  me  slip  into  the  class  room  where  a 
recitation  is  going  on.  Did  I  see  Prudence 
hesitate  for  a  brief  second  when  a  question 
was  asked  her,  and  almost  imperceptibly  did 
Agnes  move  her  lips  and  give  her  classmate 
the  clew?  I  wonder.  In  old  days,  when 
Agnes  and  Prudence  had  grandmothers  who 
went  to  a  little  district  school  on  the  edge  of 
a  prairie  or  on  the  slope  of  a  mountain,  there 
was  often  more  than  this  fleeting  look. 
241 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

There  was  low  whispering  from  one  girl  to 
another,  or  maybe  a  penciled  slip  was  fur- 
tively passed  under  cover  of  books  or  slates. 
The  clever  girl  with  the  well-prepared  lesson 
assisted  her  friend  who  had  not  studied,  and 
a  preoccupied  teacher  was  none  the  wiser, 
but  the  teacher  had  been  deceived,  the  un- 
faithful pupil  had  really  suffered  wrong  still 
worse,  the  ideal  of  honor  which  should  float 
before  a  girl's  mind  had  been  flawed  through 
a  false  notion  of  friendship.  Evil  had  en- 
tered the  class  room,  and  the  minor  morals 
were  violated. 

Human  nature  does  not  change  very  much 
with  the  passing  years.  The  schoolrooms 
that  are  closed  at  night  when  you  have  gone 
home  could  tell  many  a  tale  if  they  chose. 
Would  you  not  like  to  feel  that  there  is  noth- 
ing invisible  written  on  the  walls  and  the 
desks  and  the  blackboards  that  would  em- 
barrass you  if  suddenly  the  record  should  be- 
come plain  in  the  eyes  of  your  little  world  ? 

There  are  girls  who  never  appear  to  be 
properly  fitted  out  with  their  own  school  fur- 
niture. They  are  compelled  to  borrow  pen- 
242 


MINOR  MORALS 


cils  and  pads  and  paste  and  crayons,  and 
all  sorts  of  things,  and  they  do  this  with  so 
charming  a  grace  that  their  companions  dis- 
like to  say  no,  and  to  seem  disagreeable  by 
refusing  to  oblige  them.  But  after  awhile 
when  it  is  discovered  that  Gertrude  invaria- 
bly forgets  to  return  what  she  has  borrowed, 
that  a  book  passing  through  the  hands  of 
Grace  comes  back  far  the  worse  for  wear, 
and  that,  in  short,  neither  girl  understands  the 
distinction  between  mine  and  thine,  Mary 
and  Elizabeth,  who  are  usually  very  well  sup- 
plied with  school  apparatus,  grow  tired  of 
being  accommodating. 

Other  girls  there  are  who  borrow  small 
sums  of  money,  and  immediately  let  the 
transaction  slip  out  of  their  memory.  Their 
memories  are  treacherous,  and  drop  financial 
obligations  as  water  drops  through  a  sieve. 
This  is  certainly  worse  than  a  violation  of  a 
minor  morality.  It  is  a  good  deal  more  like 
the  breaking  of  the  eighth  commandment. 

Good  manners,  let  me  tell  you,  are  good 
morals.  Bad  manners,  such  as  loud  talking 
in  public  places,  pushing  and  shoving  in  cars 
243 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

and  on  the  ferry,  omitting  thanks  for  cour- 
tesies received,  and  interrupting  conversa- 
tion, belong  distinctly  to  the  category  of 
minor  immoralities.  It  may  easily  be  that 
a  schoolgirl  is  the  soul  of  honor,  that  she 
would  scorn  to  accept  help  in  any  indirect 
way  from  a  schoolmate  or  a  book,  and  that 
you  could  trust  her  with  untold  gold,  but  she 
may  have  rude  and  boorish  manners  all  the 
same. 

V-I  am  always  pained  when  I  hear  a  young 
girl  using  slang/  Girls  pick  up  expressions 
from  their  brothers  which  are  bad  enough  on 
boyish  lips,  but  are  still  more  out  of  place 
when  indulged  in  by  girls.  We  have  a  right 
to  expect  purity  and  sweetness  from  a  girl, 
and  refinement  in  speech  and  manner. 

I  hardly  dare  mention  such  vulgar  prac- 
tices as  the  chewing  of  gum,  eating  peanuts 
in  public  or  sitting  in  a  car  and  partaking  of 
oranges  and  bananas  when  strangers  are 
about.  Every  one  of  these  practices  may 
have  something  to  say  for  itself,  though  I 
for  one  would  draw  the  line  at  the  chewing 
of  gum,  but  all  nibbling,  munching  and  cat- 
244 


MINOR  MORALS 


ing  in  public  out  of  season  is  simply  vulgar, 
and  vulgarity  in  a  schoolgirl  is  abhorrent. 

Another  thing  that  I  beg  your  pardon  for 
so  much  as  alluding  to,  is  flirting.  Have 
your  boy  friends  as  openly  as  you  choose,  just 
as  you  have  your  girl  friends,  but  don't  notice 
boys  whom  you  do  not  know  any  more  than 
you  notice  girls;  encourage  no  familiarity 
from  passers  on  the  street,  and  do  not  form 
acquaintances  of  whom  you  would  be 
ashamed  should  you  introduce  them  to  your 
father  and  mother.  Anything  whatever 
which  has  to  be  kept  a  secret  and  hidden  away 
from  mothers  and  teachers  has  in  it  some- 
thing forbidden,  and  therefore  wholly  repre- 
hensible. Avoid  it  as  you  would  avoid  the 
touch  of  poison  ivy.  It  shatters  that  code  of 
morality  which  we  must  observe  and  obey 
whatever  our  age  may  be. 

Among  the  minor  moralities  most  fre- 
quently invaded  by  young  girls  is  deference 
to  older  people.  You  do  not  dream  how 
beautiful  it  is,  and  how  well-bred  and  attrac- 
tive it  makes  a  girl  appear  to  pay  courteous 
attention  to  her  elders  when  they  are  talking, 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

to  listen  to  their  stories,  even  though  one  has 
heard  them  before,  and  to  hasten  to  the  help 
of  those  who,  by  reason  of  years,  have  some 
infirmity.  A  girl  never  seems  so  lovable  as 
when  she  puts  aside  her  own  wishes  that  she 
may  give  pleasure  to  some  one  who  is  ill,  fee- 
ble or  encumbered  with  age  or  sorrow. 

When  Dorothy  rises  to  give  a  seat  to  a 
lady  with  gray  hair,  or  quietly  threads  a 
needle  so  that  it  may  be  ready  for  the  aunt 
or  cousin  whose  eyes  are  a  little  dim,  or  lis- 
tens respectfully  to  a  story  that  she  has  heard 
before,  yet  makes  no  sign  of  boredom,  I 
know  at  once  that  I  am  in  the  presence  of  a 
girl  whose  thinking  of  others  makes  us  think 
of  her. 

Politeness  and  grace  should  be  automatic. 
If  we  have  to  stop  and  think  about  our  man- 
ners, they  will  probably  be  clumsy.  If  we 
are  in  the  habit  of  doing  small,  dishonest 
things,  or  telling  what  people  call  fibs,  eva- 
sions and  the  like,  we  shall  one  day  be  sur- 
prised by  some  great  act  of  dishonor  or  find 
ourselves  involved  in  the  tangled  meshes  of 
some  shameful  deceit.  It  is  well  worth 
246 


MINOR  MORALS 


while,  girls,  to  look  carefully  out  for  the 
minor  morals.  Let  us  hold  our  standards 
high.  If  we  are  fastidious  in  little  things, 
great  things  will  never  give  us  a  moment's 
uneasiness. 


247 


CHAPTER  XXXV 

PROMOTION 

PROMOTION  days,  whether  they  oc- 
•*•  cur  in  midwinter  or  in  late  spring,  are 
red-letter  days.  Everybody  is  pleased  when 
we  are  promoted,  ourselves  most  of  all.  It 
is  impossible  to  avoid  a  feeling  of  satisfaction 
and  delight,  when  at  the  end  of  some  weeks 
or  months  we  discover  that  we  have  not  been 
working  in  vain,  and  that  we  have  actually 
gone  one  round  higher  upon  the  ladder.  A 
schoolgirl  is  just  as  much  pleased  when  she 
leaves  Division  B  for  Division  A  or  advances 
a  grade,  and  has  as  good  a  right  to  be  pleased 
about  it  as  the  lieutenant  when  he  becomes  a 
captain,  the  captain  when  he  gains  the  rank 
of  major,  and  the  major  when  the  people 
salute  him  as  colonel,  and  so  on. 

Promotion   is  a  sign  to  everyone  in  our 
world  that  we  are  favorites  of  fortune,  and 
248 


PROMOTION 


good  soldiers  as  well.  In  the  battles  of  life 
it  is  a  right  and  proper  thing  to  strive  for 
promotion.  Occasionally  when  a  girl  has 
done  her  very  best  and  been  faithful  to  every 
duty  and  fulfilled  every  task  throughout  a 
term,  she  fails  of  promotion.  The  powers 
that  be,  looking  over  her  work,  decide  that  it 
will  be  for  her  advantage  in  the  end  to  wait 
awhile  and  not  too  early  push  forward  in 
to  a  region  where  difficulties  beyond  her 
strength  must  be  encountered.  Their  deci- 
sion is  sure  to  be  a  disappointment  to  the  girl, 
particularly  if  she  belong  to  the  set  of  girls 
who  are  naturally  conscientious  and  diligent. 
She  will  feel  mortified  that  her  companions 
are  to  be  ahead  of  her  and  that  she  must  re- 
main in  line  with  younger  girls  or  with  those 
who  have  been  below  her.  She  feels  as  if 
everyone  was  staring  at  her,  and  as  if  dull- 
ness were  written  upon  her  forehead. 

"  There  goes  Ethel,"  she  fancies  people 
saying.  "  Poor  girl,  she  was  not  pro- 
moted." If  she  have  a  foolish  mother  she 
may  be  persuaded  to  let  her  daughter  leave 
the  school  and  start  afresh  in  another,  always 
249 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

a  very  unwise  thing  to  do,  if  the  only  reason 
for  the  change  be  that  the  pupil  must  stay 
where  she  is  long  enough  to  lay  broad  and 
deep  foundations. 

A  year  is  a  long  stretch  of  time  when  a 
girl  is  in  her  early  teens.  It  will  not  look  so 
very  long  in  years  to  come.  Twelve  months 
flit  by  very  rapidly.  I  have  known  a  pupil 
who  did  not  make  a  promotion  in  a  certain 
year  to  overtake  her  friends  by  and  by  and 
surpass  them  even  to  the  skipping  a  class. 
She  had  gained  the  ability  to  progress  very 
rapidly  in  the  end,  because  she  had  been  ex- 
tremely thorough  with  the  work  that  an- 
swered to  the  cornerstone  of  the  building  in 
her  education. 

When  we  are  promoted  we  accept  new 
responsibilities  with  our  honors.  More  is 
expected  from  us  to-day  than  was  exacted  yes- 
terday. We  are  to  set  good  examples  to 
those  who  look  up  to  us,  and  there  is  not  any- 
thing much  harder  in  this  world  than  to  be 
obliged  to  set  a  good  example.  Think  of  it, 
girls!  You  are  not  to  be  irritable  or  fault- 
finding, to  be  unpunctual  or  careless,  to  be 
250 


PROMOTION 


sketchy  instead  of  thorough,  or  untidy  in- 
stead of  neat.  Those  who  belong  to  the 
upper  classes  are  to  be  patterns  for  lower 
classes  to  imitate.  In  some  schools  there  is 
a  system  of  self-government  prevalent 
through  the  school  and  the  girls  of  the 
senior  and  sub-senior  departments  are  its  ar- 
biters and  managers,  and  they  form  its  courts 
of  appeal,  if  any  mooted  point  arises. 

I  need  not  enlarge  upon  this,  for  if  I  am 
not  mistaken  a  girl  never  feels  much  older 
than  when  she  is  in  the  senior  class  in  her 
school.  Perhaps  I  ought  to  tell  you  not  to 
carry  too  many  burdens  or  take  life  too  seri- 
ously, since  after  all  girlhood  should  be  a 
care-free  and  very  happy  time. 

Generally  speaking,  faithful  work  done 
day  by  day  results  in  promotion,  at  least 
while  we  are  in  school.  Illness  may  inter- 
vene, or  we  may  be  kept  back  by  some  trou- 
ble with  the  eyes,  or  ears,  that  causes  inatten- 
tion and  makes  us  lose  the  thread  of  what  is 
being  taught.  Few  girls  are  so  clever  that 
they  can  learn  without  close  attention. 

Sometimes  a  girl  has  too  many  conflicting 

251 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

engagements,  as  for  instance,  when  she  ven- 
tures on  the  borderland  of  society.  A  school- 
girl has  no  business  with  evening  companies, 
theatres,  concerts,  or  social  entertainments  of 
any  kind  whatever.  Her  round  of  duties  is 
clasped  by  two  words,  home  and  school. 
Lessons  cannot  all  be  studied  to  advantage 
in  the  schoolroom,  and  a  portion  of  school 
work  must  be  taken  home  and  done  there. 
Health  is  of  the  utmost  importance,  and  to 
keep  it  at  the  highest  point,  a  girl  must  have 
plenty  of  exercise  out  of  doors,  or  in  the 
gymnasium,  and  must  not  forget  that  the  best 
hours  for  recreation  are  those  that  directly 
follow  the  afternoon  closing  of  school. 

Evening  hours  should  be  devoted  to  prep- 
aration for  another  day,  and  for  a  school- 
girl the  old  rule  of  "  early  to  bed  and  early 
to  rise  "  has  no  exceptions.  If  we  would  be 
promoted  we  must  take  time  to  sleep  that  the 
brain  may  be  rested  and  ready  to  do  its  work. 

The    conclusion    of   the    matter    is    this: 

Don't  be  unduly  elated  when  you  succeed, 

and  don't  be  altogether  crushed  when  you 

fail.     The  people  in  this  world  who  gain 

252 


PROMOTION 


what  they  want  in  the  end  are  those  who  can- 
not be  rebuffed  or  disheartened  when  things 
go  wrong.  If  they  slip  down  they  scramble 
up,  and  try  again.  They  are  like  the  man 
in  Mother  Goose  who  jumped  into  a  bramble 
bush,  and  scratched  out  both  his  eyes. 

"  And  when  he  found  his  eyes  were  out, 
With  all  his  might  and  main, 

He  jumped  into  another  bush 
And  scratched  them  in  again." 

If  we  do  our  best  we  deserve  reward 
whether  we  receive  it  or  not,  and  there  is  a 
rich  reward  in  an  approving  conscience. 


253 


CHAPTER  XXXVI 

THE  PRESIDENT  OF  HER  CLASS 

A  MY  is  president  of  her  class !  Amy 
is  not  the  oldest  girl  in  it,  nor  the  pret- 
tiest, nor  the  best  dressed,  nor  even  the  one 
of  best  scholarship.  Ruth  has  higher  marks, 
Edith  has  finer  clothes,  Florence  is  the  class 
beauty,  and  Phebe  is  probably  the  girl  with 
the  largest  number  of  birthdays.  While  we 
are  young  we  esteem  it  a  cause  for  congrat- 
ulation, that  we  are  nearer  twenty  than  some- 
body who  is  only  fifteen.  If  we  are  eighteen 
we  are  proud  of  the  distinction.  Only  as 
time,  the  thief  of  so  many  happy  things, 
steals  away  our  pride  in  our  years,  do  we  try 
to  hide  them.  You  girls  at  school  are  all 
beautifully  and  blissfully  young,  bless  your 
dear  hearts,  and  you  need  not  try  to  conceal 
the  fact. 

A  girl  I  knew  once  happened  by  chance  to 
254 


PRESIDENT  OF  HER  CLASS 

see  a  sentence  about  her,  in  a  letter  not  meant 
for  her  eyes.  The  letter  said :  "  Theodora 
is  very  young,  and  her  appearance  indicates 
it."  Though  Theodora  had  apple-brown  in 
her  cheeks,  and  eyes  like  stars,  and  a  mass  of 
chestnut  hair  with  glints  of  sunshine  thread- 
ing it,  she  cried  when  she  found  that  people 
thought  she  looked  young.  She  wanted  to 
look  old !  Poor  little  Theodora. 

Why  is  a  girl  chosen  as  class  president, 
why  Amy  rather  than  Sue,  or  Rachel  ? 

Well,  girls,  probably  for  two  or  three 
reasons.  A  girl  who  is  thus  honored  by  the 
suffrages  of  her  mates,  is  a  popular  person. 
She  has  not  gone  around  with  a  chip  on  her 
shoulder.  She  has  never  made  enemies  by 
unlucky  speeches.  She  does  not  make  fun  of 
her  friends,  nor  indulge  in  wit  at  their  ex- 
pense. This  is  on  the  negative  side  of  the 
question. 

On  the  affirmative  side  the  popular  girl 
has  lost  no  opportunity  to  do  little  kindnesses 
at  the  right  moment.  She  speaks  cordially 
of  the  absent.  She  performs  graceful  serv- 
ices graciously.  She  is  in  the  public  eye, 

255 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

more  or  less,  and  people  know  where  they 
can  find  her.  If  asked  to  do  anything  oblig- 
ing, she  does  it  without  a  fuss. 

The  popular  girl  has  a  troop  of  friends, 
because  she  is  friendly.  Every  one  can  de- 
pend on  her  not  to  make  a  stupid  mistake, 
and  to  say  the  proper  word  in  the  proper 
place.  She  possesses  tact.  To  the  average 
girl,  tact  is  a  better  gift  than  good  looks,  or 
great  learning.  It  makes  a  girl  quick  to  un- 
derstand people,  and  it  makes  them  like  her. 
A  girl  who  has  tact  always  helps  other  people 
to  be  at  their  best,  and  that  is  much  finer  than 
to  be  brilliant  and  showy  in  one's  own  char- 
acter. 

The  president  of  a  class  generally  is  a  girl 
with  charm.  Amy  has  had  charm  from  her 
cradle.  What  is  it?  How  shall  it  be  ex- 
plained? Dear  girl,  it  is  impossible  to  define 
charm  in  set  terms.  It  is  the  perfume  of  a 
flower,  it  is  the  sweetness  of  the  violin,  it  is  the 
soft  shimmer  of  the  moon,  it  is  the  sigh  of  the 
surf  when  last  it  breaks  upon  the  shore.  A 
girl  who  has  charm  steals  into  one's  heart. 
She  may  be  a  gentle  mouse  of  a  girl,  demure 
256 


PRESIDENT  OF  HER  CLASS 

and  quiet,  or  a  merry  breeze-like  girl,  coming 
indoors  with  the  swing  of  the  wind,  but  her 
charm,  if  genuine,  will  belong  to  her  person- 
ality and  be  a  part  of  her. 

City  girls  have  this  endowment  and  so 
have  country  girls.  A  good  deal  of  it  de- 
pends on  being  free  from  self-absorption. 
No  girl  who  is  thinking  much  about  herself 
ever  has  charm.  Homely  girls  often  have 
it  and  pretty  girls  miss  it,  so  you  see  it  does 
not  need  to  go  with  a  roseleaf  skin  and  dim- 
ples. But  Amy  would  not  be  chosen  as  class- 
president  if  the  other  girls  had  not  been  im- 
pressed by  her  charm. 

Still  another  excellent  quality,  and  one 
that  a  leader  always  has,  is  force.  Without 
force  nobody  can  hope  to  lead.  Most  of  us 
are  followers.  Only  here  and  there  springs 
up  the  girl  who  leads.  It  is  never  by  bluster 
or  vehemence,  by  over  emphasis  and  self-as- 
sertion, or  by  any  display  of  arrogance  and 
bad  manners,  that  a  girl  becomes  a  leader. 
Force  of  character  is  a  flame  within  the  soul, 
that  shines  out  in  daily  conduct. 

A  weak  girl  takes  the  color  of  the  last  per- 

257 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

son  who  talks  with  her.  Why,  you  may 
often  tell  with  whom  a  girl  has  been  asso- 
ciating by  her  inflections,  her  tones,  and  her 
pet  phrases.  As  for  opinions,  the  weak  per- 
son may  think  she  has  them,  but  in  reality 
she  has  only  prejudices,  which  are  very  dif- 
ferent. 

But  should  you  ask  me  what  attribute  in  a 
girl  will  help  her  to  be  most  successfully  presi- 
dent of  her  class,  I  think  I  will  pick  out  this 
beyond  every  other.  She  must  have  what  we 
call  initiative.  That  is,  she  must  be  able  to 
suggest  new  lines,  to  strike  out  in  new  paths, 
and  to  convince  the  other  girls  that  her  ideas 
are  good.  A  girl  who  is  a  slave  to  system, 
who  cares  principally  how  things  look,  and  is 
in  terror  about  what  people  will  say,  is  not  a 
girl  with  initiative. 

She  must  not  be  a  coward,  either.  Not 
long  ago  a  school  play  was  to  be  presented. 
The  rehearsals  were  over,  the  evening  had 
arrived,  and  the  spectators  were  there.  But 
one  girl  who  had  an  important  part  in  the 
first  act,  at  the  last  moment  refused  to  go  on 
the  stage  because  her  gloves  were  too  short. 
258 


PRESIDENT  OF  HER  CLASS 

She  sulked  and  pouted.  Her  gloves  did  not 
reach  the  elbow.  Another  girl,  infected  by 
her  behavior,  discovered  that  her  shoes  had 
not  the  right  buckles.  There  was  dismay  be- 
hind the  scenes.  Katherine  and  Elinor  stood 
there  in  rebellion.  And  the  class-president 
was  sent  for.  "  Katherine,"  she  said,  not 
elegantly,  but  positively,  "  shut  up !  "  "  El- 
inor, go  on  with  your  lines.  They  are  wait- 
ing for  you !  "  Both  girls  obeyed  at  once. 
They  recognized  the  accent  of  authority. 

Girls,  whoever  else  fails  or  succeeds,  she 
who  takes  a  front  rank  and  is  conspicuous 
must  do  the  latter.  She  cannot  fail.  She 
must  succeed.  The  president  of  her  class 
must  win  the  favor  and  confidence  of  her 
teachers,  and  must  not  be  afraid  to  take  a 
firm  stand  when  occasion  requires  and  so  to 
act  that  her  classmates  are  proud  of  her. 

She  must  learn  a  little  bit  of  parliamentary 
law,  so  that  in  the  meetings  she  shall  take 
the  chair  with  ease  and  grace.  This  will 
help  her  to  engineer  a  meeting  well,  and  she 
must  not  have  private  ends  when  she  does 
this,  but  must  endeavor  to  be  perfectly  fair 
259 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

and  to  do  what  is  best  for  the  good  of  the 
whole. 

Unless  she  docs  not  shrink  from  extra  work 
and  from  taking  pains,  a  girl  would  much 
better  decline  this  honor.  If  she  does  accept 
it  she  must  pay  the  price. 


260 


CHAPTER  XXXVII 

COMMENCEMENT   SEASON 

"Vf  OU  ought  to  have  good  times  at  com- 
mencements,  girls.  You  have  had 
plenty  of  hard  study  and  really  strenuous 
work  during  the  school  year,  and  when  com- 
mencement comes  it  is  a  good  deal  more  to 
you  than  just  an  opportunity  to  receive  your 
diplomas. 

The  diplomas  are  testimonials  of  your 
merit,  and  they  have  value  for  that  reason. 
A  girl  carrying  home  her  diploma  with  its 
signatures  of  teachers  and  examiners  has  a 
right  to  be  proud  and  happy.  If  she  care 
enough  about  this  certificate  of  progress  to 
have  it  framed  and  hung  in  her  own  room, 
it  will  always  be  a  souvenir  of  the  brightest 
period  of  her  life.  Unless  it  is  framed,  it 
may  be  lost  to  view.  You  may  have  jolly 
and  genial  days  later  on,  but  never  any  will 
261 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

be  more  thoroughly  delightful  than  those  you 
have  passed  in  the  schoolroom  in  your  early 
teens.  The  diploma  is  a  milestone  that 
marks  red-letter  days. 

Clustering  around  commencement  are  a 
number  of  functions  that,  each  and  all,  are 
extremely  pleasant  to  girls  who  have  kept 
pace  together,  day  by  day,  week  by  week,  for 
ten  months  of  the  twelve.  In  some  schools 
there  is  a  ceremony  of  tree-planting  or  ivy- 
planting  at  commencement,  and  as  each  class 
brings  its  spade  and  trowel,  selects  a  spot  for 
its  vine  or  tree,  and  sings  its  song  of  joy, 
older  people  looking  on  have  a  vision  of  the 
future. 

Ten  or  twenty  years  hence,  where  shall 
this  merry  company  be  and  what  changes 
will  have  taken  place  in  this  cheery  circle 
of  gay  young  girls?  Who  knows?  One 
thing  is  certain;  the  girls  who  plant  the  ivy 
will  never  forget  their  school,  and  now  and 
then  they  will  return  to  it  to  renew  the  old 
associations.  Very  likely  in  days  to  come 
girls  like  you  will  bring  casts  and  pictures  to 
adorn  the  walls  of  the  recitation  rooms  and 
262 


COMMENCEMENT  SEASON 

assembly  rooms  that  have  meant  so  much  in 
the  beginning  of  their  careers. 

Class  day,  with  its  informality  and  fun,  is 
one  of  the  most  agreeable  features  of  the 
commencement  season.  In  order  to  have  it 
successful  those  who  take  part  in  the  exer- 
cises should  be  carefully  chosen.  In  a  spirit 
of  good-humored  banter,  the  girls  who  write 
the  class  history  and  the  class  prophecy  must 
hit  off  points  in  the  character  of  their  friends. 
No  one  in  the  class  is  exempt  from  the  merry 
comment,  not  in  the  least  malicious,  but  al- 
ways mirth-provoking,  that  describes  each 
girl  in  turn.  Even  the  teachers,  if  popular 
and  beloved,  are  not  exempt  from  the  gay 
raillery  of  class  day. 

Last  year  a  girl  neighbor  of  mine  gave  me 
a  peep  beforehand  into  the  class  histories  and 
prophecies  which  had  been  evolved  from  the 
clever  brains  of  the  class  committee.  I  did 
not  wonder  that  when  these  facetious  crit- 
icisms were  given  in  the  presence  of  the  class 
the  laughter  was  immoderate.  Never  is 
laughter  so  untrammeled  and  so  free,  never 
are  jests  so  well  received  as  on  class  day,  in 
263 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

a  school  where  the  girls  know  one  another 
intimately  and  understand  all  one  another's 
little  ways.  Little  vanities,  little  tricks  of 
gesture,  little  oddities  of  manner,  have  their 
appropriate  niche  in  the  class  history. 

But  when  class  prophecies  are  attempted, 
there  are  often  flashes  of  silence  in  the  mid- 
dle of  the  mirth.  No  matter  how  high  runs 
the  tide  of  fun,  nobody  can  forget  that  after 
commencement  there  will  be  separations  and 
good-bys,  that  girls  who  have  shared  the 
same  seat  may  go  one  to  the  east  and  one 
to  the  west,  and  that  the  everyday  compan- 
ionship will  be  at  an  end. 

Some  time  during  commencement,  if  prac- 
ticable, there  should  be  a  feast.  Let  the 
table  be  decorated  with  flowers  in  the  class 
colors,  and  let  the  toast  mistress  do  her  part. 
She  must  not  leave  anything  to  the  moment. 
Some  days  previous  to  the  feast  the  toast 
mistress  must  make  a  list  of  sentiments  appro- 
priate to  the  time  and  place  and  arrange  with 
certain  girls  so  that  they  will  be  ready  to  re- 
spond. A  break  in  the  speeches  may  be  pleas- 
antly made  by  the  singing  of  class  songs,  and 
264 


COMMENCEMENT  SEASON 

if  there  are  one  or  two  musical  girls  who  can 
play  the  violin,  or  mandolin,  or  the  banjo,  let 
them  contribute  something  to  the  program. 

You  will  find  it  a  good  plan  whenever  you 
have  a  social  function  of  any  kind  ahead  of 
you  to  provide  carefully  for  every  detail. 
Nothing  should  be  left  to  accident. 

When  commencement  days  are  over  and 
you  start  your  preparations  for  something 
new,  whether  it  be  a  vacation  journey  or  a 
little  practical  housekeeping,  a  visit  to  grand- 
parents or  country  cousins,  or  some  special 
work  that  will  fit  you  for  a  higher  institution 
of  learning,  do  not  let  go  your  hold  of  the 
old  friends.  Those  who  live  in  the  same 
town  will  naturally  meet  often.  Those  who 
reside  in  places  apart  will  find  their  interest 
growing  less,  and  as  this  is  a  great  pity  and 
a  sort  of  waste  it  is  well  to  keep  the  fire  of 
friendship  alight  by  means  of  correspond- 
ence. 

Believe  me,  girls,  on  the  road  of  life  you 
and  I  will  find  few  things  more  worth  while 
than  comradeship. 

265 


CHAPTER  XXXVIII 

A  SCHOOLGIRL'S  CALENDAR 

T  WONDER  if  you  ever  think,  dear  girls, 
•*•  what  story  the  calendar  is  telling  for  you. 
Perhaps  you  have  a  tiny  pocket  calendar 
tucked  into  your  purse  that  you  may  consult 
it  if  you  happen,  as  careless  people  some- 
times do,  to  forget  the  date;  not  that  I  fancy 
you  belong  to  that  set  or  that  you  do  not 
keep  tally  of  the  days  of  the  month. 

A  good  plan  for  us  all  is  to  remember 
just  where  we  are,  so  that  we  never  have  to 
pause  and  ask  somebody  to  tell  us  whether 
it  is  the  eighth  or  the  ninth,  the  tenth  or 
the  twelfth  day  of  the  month.  You  may 
keep  a  calendar  on  your  dressing  bureau, 
tearing  off  a  leaf  every  day,  or  it  may  hang 
suspended  from  a  nail  by  a  ribbon  or  a  chain, 
or  be  fastened  on  the  wall.  Whatever  sort 
266 


A  SCHOOLGIRL'S  CALENDAR 

of  calendar  you  have  it  is  simply  a  device 
to  remind  you  that  time  is  flying  and  that 
it  is  well  to  make  the  most  of  it  and  of 
its  opportunities  before  it  is  gone  out  of 
sight.  Just  one  day  at  a  time  is  yours  and 
mine,  and  according  as  we  use  or  abuse  the 
single  day,  we  shall  get  the  good  that  is 
waiting  for  us  and  earn  the  reward  that 
comes  to  faithful  workers. 

I  am  very  fond  of  all  sorts  and  condi- 
tions of  girls,  but  there  is  one  variety  with 
which  I  have  no  patience;  the  girl  who 
dawdles,  who  sits  around  talking  about  what 
she  means  to  do  and  never  accomplishing 
anything,  is  not  the  girl  who  commends  her- 
self to  me.  She  is  not  only  idle  herself,  but 
she  sets  a  bad  example  to  every  one  else  and 
commits  the  mistake  of  throwing  away  the 
most  valuable  asset  she  will  ever  have.  A 
day  when  one  is  young  and  strong  and  light- 
hearted  as  girls  are  or  should  be,  is  worth 
ten  times  as  much  as  a  day  will  be  when  the 
same  girls  are  older  and  know  more  about 
care  and  trouble.  Is  your  story  of  the  caien- 
267 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

dar  a  story  of  work  well-done  and  of  play 
undertaken  with  all  your  heart?  Whatever 
you  do,  never  dawdle. 

There  is  something  else  to  think  about  in 
the  story  of  the  calendar. 

It  is  n't  the  thing  you  do,  dear, 

It  's  the  thing  you  leave  undone, 
That  gives  you  a  bit  of  a  heartache 

At  the  setting  of  the  sun. 
The  tender  word  forgotten ; 

The  letter  you  did  not  write ; 
The  flower  you  did  not  send,  dear, 

Are  your  haunting  ghosts  at  night. 

The  stone  you  might  have  lifted 

Out  of  a  brother's  way ; 
The  bit  of  heartsome  counsel 

You  were  hurried  too  much  to  say; 
The  loving  touch  of  the  hand,  dear, 

And  the  gentle,  winning  tone, 
That  you  had  no  time  or  thought  for 

With  troubles  enough  of  your  own. 

Those  little  acts  of  kindness 

So  easily  out  of  mind, 
Those  chances  to  be  angels 

Which  we  poor  mortals  find, 
They  come  in  night  and  silence, 

Each  sad,  reproachful  wraith, 
268 


A  SCHOOLGIRL'S  CALENDAR 

When  hope  is  faint  and  flagging 
And  a  chill  has  fallen  on  faith. 

For  life  is  all  too  short,  dear, 

And  sorrow  is  all  too  great, 
To  suffer  our  slow  compassion 

That  tarries  until  too  late; 
And  it  is  n't  the  things  you  do,  dear, 

It 's  the  thing  you  leave  undone 
That  gives  you  a  bit  of  a  heartache 

At  the  setting  of  the  sun. 

I  do  not  want  the  girls  I  care  for  to  go 
about  with  the  weight  of  the  world  on  their 
shoulders,  or  would  I  like  to  see  them  al- 
ways bothering  about  the  impression  they  are 
making  or  the  number  of  things  they  were 
accomplishing  from  Monday  until  Saturday. 
It  is  quite  possible  to  make  such  a  fuss  over 
one's  duty  that  one  tires  all  one's  friends  and 
succeeds  in  frightening  the  average  person 
out  of  one's  neighborhood. 

But  our  sins  of  omission  foot  up  a  long 
account  against  us.  Let  us  look  candidly  at 
any  day  we  choose.  Perhaps  for  conven- 
ience, we  will  take  to-day.  When  we  came 
downstairs  this  morning,  had  we  a  pleasant 
word  for  every  one ;  did  we  bring  our  smiles 
269 


HAPPY  SCHOOL  DAYS 

to  the  breakfast  table;  did  we  go  to  the  door 
with  father  or  pin  a  flower  in  his  button- 
hole; did  we  watch  for  a  chance  to  help 
mother  and  were  we  nice  and  kind  in  our 
manner  to  the  maid  in  the  kitchen? 

The  story  of  the  calendar  for  you,  too, 
must  be  a  story  of  health  or  illness.  God 
gives  us  plenty  of  bright  sunshine  and  clear 
bracing  air,  but  some  of  us  seem  to  prefer 
to  shut  ourselves  up  in  close,  stuffy  rooms  and 
to  live  in  the  dark.  If  we  do  that  every  day 
we  may  expect  to  be  pale  and  sallow,  to  have 
headaches  and  backaches  and  aches  too  nu- 
merous to  mention. 

Although  you  seldom  think  of  it,  the  story 
of  the  calendar  is  writing  itself  on  your  face. 
Every  day  that  you  live  is  either  making  you 
beautiful  or  making  you  plain.  If  you  never 
pout  or  frown  or  screw  your  forehead  into 
a  tangle  or  draw  down  the  corners  of  your 
mouth  into  a  sullen  droop,  you  will  gain  a 
sweet,  sunny  expression  that  will  make  peo- 
ple glad  when  they  look  at  you.  I  can  think 
of  two  or  three  young  people  whose  faces 
seem  to  glow  as  if  from  an  inward  light. 
270 


A  SCHOOLGIRL'S  CALENDAR 

If  every  day  you  have  pure  thoughts  and 
never  indulge  in  one  that  is  unwholesome, 
your  face  will  have  in  it  something  as  fresh 
and  innocent  as  the  soul  behind  it.  Not  so 
much  beautiful  features  as  a  beautiful  soul 
can  make  a  beautiful  face.  To  be  kind  in 
your  judgments,  interested  in  your  friends, 
simple  and  sincere  in  all  you  do,  every  day 
of  your  life,  will  give  you  an  attractiveness 
that  cannot  be  described. 

On  the  porch  of  the  house  where  I  live 
there  is  a  crimson  rambler  rose.  You  never 
saw  anything  grow  so  fast  as  this  rose.  It 
climbs  higher  and  higher,  flings  out  its 
wreaths  of  bloom  and  is  a  perfect  joy.  Girls 
should  be  like  this,  growing,  reaching  up- 
ward, filling  their  little  world  with  bloom  and 
fragrance,  and  living  day  by  day  in  the  air 
and  in  the  sun.  You  are  in  God's  world,  my 
dears,  see  that  day  by  day  you  make  the  most 
of  it. 

THE    END 


271 


A       f\  """iiiiiiiill/lll 


